


Winter Suns

by FayH2



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Don’t expect miracles. Our boy Ned Stark will still Ned Stark, F/M, Gen, I will introduce new names as they appear, I’m here to play with the ages of characters, Ships don’t sail for a while, The Jon/Arya will take its time. Come for the story, The Others decided to hold off for another few hundred years, there are no main characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:48:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 48
Words: 270,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26372218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FayH2/pseuds/FayH2
Summary: What if Ned Stark arrived at King's Landing just a few hours earlier and got to Elia before the Mountain raped and killed her?What if the Martells knew of Jon’s true heritage and kept it secret?What if Ned Stark faked the deaths of Arthur Dayne, Gerold Hightower & Oswell Whent?That’s right, I’m here to crack crackery once again.
Relationships: Aegon Targaryen/Arianne Martell, Ashara Dayne/Ned Stark, Elia Martell & Aegon Targaryen, Elia Martell & Jon Snow, Elia Martell & Ned Stark, Elia Martell & Oberyn Martell & Doran Martell, Elia Martell/Ethan Glover, Jon Snow/Arya Stark, Ned Stark/Catelyn Stark, Wylla Manderly/Robb Stark
Comments: 1751
Kudos: 1012
Collections: Southern Renaissance (Dorne Renaissance)





	1. Elia

**Author's Note:**

> Hello there it’s your girl, back on her nonsense!

**Elia 283 AC**

Varys had warned her of what to expect.  _ The worst,  _ he said. Her breath was shaky, her hands clammy and her eyes blurry. She felt faint but she couldn’t be weak, not now. Not while Rhaenys was here singing to and stroking her kitten. Aerys had placed guards at her door to prevent her from leaving. He had brought her here to this hell hole of his making to ensure the loyalty of her brother. He had sent her uncle, Prince Lewyn, to his death for Rhaegar’s prophecy fuelled folly, and he had sentenced her...and Rhaenys and this poor baby to death if Varys was to be believed. Her uncle had died protecting Rhaegar. She was sure of it. Her uncle died for the man’s madness and now she would too. Just as Brandon and Rickard Stark paid for his madness. Just as the realm would now. The king may have had some semblance of peace had he not called for the heads of the girl’s brother and betrothed. 

Elia remembered the day Brandon Stark came cavaliering in shouting for Rhaegar to “Come out and die.” She thought of her own brother, Oberyn, as fiery as the sun and just as untameable. She had no doubts in her mind that Oberyn would have done the exact same thing if Elia was to disappear with a man one day, one who everyone would think had kidnapped her. Brandon and his men had been thrown in the cells. 

She also remembered what became of Lyanna Stark’s brother, so much like her own, as well as her father.  _ King Scab _ had made Elia come to court to watch. She watched as Rickard Stark demanded a trial by combat. Brave and strong, he had armoured himself, expecting to fight one of the Kingsguard. And then the mad man declared his champion. Fire. They suspended Lord Stark from the rafters, kindling the fire beneath him and cooking him, all while his son choked to death in an attempt to free him. Sometimes when Elia closed her eyes she saw the son struggle and the father cook. Two more innocent men dead because of Rhaegar. Elia scoffed. She knew better than to blame the poor girl. She was little more than a child herself. But Rhaegar? For Rhaegar Elia held all her ire.  _ Was your prophecy worth all this?  _ she wanted to ask him. Ten thousand Dornish men left with her uncle for his war. So few returned.  _ How does a man judge which lives are worth saving and which aren’t?  _ He had said Aegon’s was the song of ice and fire but now Aegon...well, if Varys was right, the babe in her arms would be dead soon. 

She wished her friend were here. She sent Ashara back to Starfall when she lost the babe. It was shortly after she heard of his marriage. Her quiet, shy man. “Elia, he doesn’t want this. He can’t!” she had cried. Elia held her knowing what men’s hearts could be like. She wasn’t so sure herself. After all, the man who had been declared to be of one flesh, one heart, one soul, now and forever left her to the mercy of his mad father. And for what? 

Elia watched them open the city gates. 

She rocked the sleeping boy and walked over to her beautiful girl, trying...trying so hard not to scare her.  _ It’s the Lannister soldiers outside _ she told herself.  _ Perhaps we won’t have to face the worst imaginable fate. Mother was a friend of Lady Joanna Lannister and Jaime has tried to be a friend to me. _

“Mother,” Rhaenys said, “why is the baby's face covered?” 

Elia looked at the cowl on the boy’s head. Only his mouth and nose showed as he slept. “It’s to help him sleep. Shall I sing you a song?” she asked. Rhaenys loved songs. She sat on the rocking chair beside the window. 

_ A bear there was, a bear, a bear! _

_ All black and brown, and covered with hair. _

_ The bear! The bear! _

Elia heard scraping along the walls. She focused on what she could control. She tried to steady her voice and continued rocking on the chair with the babe in her lap. 

_ Oh come they said, oh come to the fair! _

_ The fair? Said he, but I'm a bear! _

_ All black and brown, and covered with hair! _

_ And down the road from here to there. _

_ From here! To there! _

_ Three boys, a goat and a dancing bear! _

_ They danced and spun, all the way to the fair! _

_ The fair! The fair! _

She heard running and shouting along the corridors.  _ Keep rocking,  _ she told herself. She smiled for her girl and continued her song. 

_ Oh, sweet she was, and pure and fair! _

_ The maid with honey in her hair! _

_ Her hair! Her hair! _

_ The maid with honey in her hair! _

The scraping continued.  _ Maegor’s Holdfast was created to withstand this sort of thing,  _ she reminded herself. She thought of the iron spikes and the dry moat. She continued rocking, looking at the baby boy in her arms and her smiling daughter and the small black kitten.

_ The bear smelled the scent on the summer air. _

_ The bear! The bear! _

_ All black and brown and covered with hair! _

_ He smelled the scent on the summer air! _

_ He sniffed and roared and smelled it there! _

_ Honey on the summer air! _

She couldn’t stay here in the nursery. She stood up and took Rhaenys’ hand.  _ Rhaegar’s chambers. Rhaegar’s chambers are where we will go. It has to be more secure.  _

“Come along, Rhae,” she said pleasantly. It was on the floor above. If anything, it may buy them just a little more time. There were no more guards outside her door.  _ Where did they go?  _

She grabbed her daughter’s hand and began to speedily walk up the spiral steps. “Hide under the bed, Rhae,” she told her daughter. That’s when she heard the glass break. A portly man broke through. He had a piggy face with small pig eyes.  _ Amory Lorch.  _ She had seen him once when Mother had taken her and Oberyn to Casterly Rock. Even then, they knew of what he had done to the young Lord Tarbeck. He threw a three year old child,  _ Rhae’s age,  _ down a well.

“Well, what do we have here?” he grinned, rubbing his hands together. 

“M-my lord,” Elia said, holding tight to the babe in her arms. 

“Hand me the boy.” 

Elia straightened her shoulders.  _ I am of Dorne. I am unbent, unbowed, unbroken.  _ “You do not order me.” Elia retorted. “I am your princess.” Even as she said that her hands trembled and her knees felt like they would buckle at any moment. Her mouth was dry and her heart felt like it could crash out of her chest so hard was it beating. 

“Hand.me.the.boy,” he ground out. 

Elia heard men shouting and screaming below her. She spotted a candle holder not too far from her, she moved toward it when, Balerion, the kitten ran out from under the bed. 

“Oops.” Rhaenys gasped. Elia could imagine her daughter’s face. Every time she said the word she threw her hand to her mouth. She noticed the moment the sound registered with Amory Lorch. He stepped toward Rhaegar’s bed. The bed upon which Rhaenys was conceived. Elia felt the bile come to her throat, she grabbed the candle holder. A wildness seized her.  _ I am the viper’s sister.  _ She placed the baby on the bed, far from Amory Lorch and smashed the solid gold candle holder into his head. The man was dazed for a moment. Elia looked at the bloodied candle holder in her hand and turned to the bed shouting, “Rhaenys run! Now!” 

The moment she turned back around to face the man, that a moment ago had been on his knees, he was back on his feet and the next thing she knew  _ she _ was on the floor with a burning cheek from his backhand blow. He grabbed Rhaenys’ foot before she could think and began to stab her child. Again and again and again. Elia grabbed his face, clawing at it from behind, trying to find his eyes. She bit his ear but he threw his head back and she fell off of him and fell flat on the floor. Elia was never strong. Her head spun. She heard the babe cry out but Rhaenys was silent. 

“Rhaenys!” Elia screamed, scrambling to her daughter where the butcher continued his stabbing. Her baby girl was gone, no peep came out of her; he continued to stab her again and again and again. Over Elia’s own screams the baby howled. Elia stood. She grabbed the second candle holder, a gift from her brother Oberyn for her wedding to Rhaegar and swung it with all her strength and whacked him over the head. He fell over. Elia ran to her baby and picked her up.

“Rhaenys!” She slapped her face lightly. “Rhaenys!” she shook her. Her voice was more shrill now. “Rhaenys. Open your eyes, baby.” She snuck a look at the man lying on the floor. “Rhaenys.” Her girl was not responsive. Elia placed her finger under her child’s nose. She wasn’t breathing.

Her head was still spinning.  _ My baby is gone.  _ Elia’s breath came out in rasps as the horror of her blood stained child flooded her senses. The baby boy’s howls made way for breathless whimpers. She turned her head to him. He was struggling to catch his breath so loud was his crying. 

Elia couldn’t save her child but...perhaps she could save this innocent child. She kissed her baby, wishing she was strong enough to carry her and the child both. She ran for the child wearing only the one slipper and scrambled out of the room, unsure of where she would go. She heard screams but she saw through her tear blurred eyes that there was no one moving in this corridor. 

Then suddenly, behind her she heard, “Where did the bitch go?” along with more men’s voices. She scrambled, begging the child to hold his cries but what could a poor babe know about danger except to cry in case of fear? It’s what he did. She ran down the stairs, jumping over bodies, feeling exhausted. She was never the strongest or the fastest or the fittest. She heard what sounded like earth shattering footsteps behind her. Whoever was coming sounded like an army all by himself.  _ Where is everyone? Couldn’t Aerys spare even one guard for his grandchildren? His heirs!,  _ she lamented. She could hear her battering heart beat loud in her ears as she tried to work out what to do next or where to go. The footsteps behind her started to get louder. She heard clattering of metal on metal and ran into the nursery that she was in earlier, the poor boy in her arms continued to wail. “Please shush,” she rocked him as she continued to breathe heavily, leaning against the door she just locked. “Please,” she begged. The poor child continued to scream.

All of a sudden the door heaved with just one push. Whoever was on the other side was going to break in at any moment. Elia scrambled for whatever she could but there was no weapon she could see.  _ This is a nursery.  _ She put the babe down in Aegon’s cot and dashed to the cabinet that held Rhaenys’ toys.  _ My baby _ . And she pushed, heaving, finding all the strength in her body to push it in front of the door.  _ It’ll bar their entry by a few seconds and nothing more,  _ she realised when  _ BANG _ they battered the door again and then  _ BANG _ a fist broke through. The largest fist Elia Martell had ever seen. She stumbled back, hitting the back of her leg on the bed and having to balance herself again. She saw the sigil on his surcoat when his fist burst through the door once more. Three black dogs on a yellow field.  _ Rhaegar had knighted him.  _ Gregor Clegane. She stepped back slowly, her hands searching for the child. She could not take her eyes from the door.  _ BANG _ ! This time the wood splintered to make a large enough gap for the gargantuan man to reach through and turn the key that was still inside the door. He grinned at her. Elia gulped and held the child to her chest.  _ Varys was right. This is where I die.  _ She had begged him to get Rhaenys out too but he said that any child changed for Rhaenys would be recognised. The babe in her arms looked enough like her child but he did not have the birthmark her Egg did on his chest. Not many people would know that. She had told Varys to send her babe to her brothers but he said the babe would be sent across the sea to be safe. Elia had no choice but to trust him. Her brothers weren’t here. 

She kept her eyes on the man that had pushed through the cabinet barring the door as if it were nothing.  _ This is where I die.  _

She stepped back and back and back again until the wall pushed her back. She looked at the baby in her arms. Suddenly still and not wailing.  _ Does he know too that this is our end?  _

Elia gulped and looked at the man. She knew it was the end. She would not cower. She would stare death in the face even as she trembled and her heart beat as fast as one of Oberyn’s sand steeds.  _ Doran will kill them all. I know it.  _ She reminded herself of her words.  _ Unbowed, unbent, unbroken.  _ She raised her head up and spat in Gregor Clegane’s face. 

He smacked her. She tasted blood in her mouth. She angled her body away from him, placing herself between him and the now crying baby. He pulled her by her hair. She threw herself back, trying to unbalance him, perhaps if she did she could run out of the room. He didn’t move. As if he were a wall of stone and not a man made of flesh. He let out a single croak of mocking laughter. “Hah!” and pulled her by her hair back until she was on the floor. The baby landed on her chest. She grabbed him tight and began to slide back using one hand to help her. He walked toward her. One step at a time. She moved, crying, she moved until the wall stopped her again. 

In one swift move he grabbed the baby by his ankle and smashed his head against the wall. Elia heard someone screaming the most heart-wrenching scream until she realised it was her. He swung the boy again and she saw his face was gone, bloodied but completely unrecognisable, his silver-gold hair made way for blood-red. Again he smashed the child into the wall and let him fall next to her. Elia screamed when she saw what befell the babe. His brains were leaking out on the floor. She scrambled away, fearing for herself, mourning the child and Rhaenys.  _ He’s going to kill me next. He’s going to kill me next.  _ She struggled to breathe. There wasn’t enough air in the room she thought, though she could see the window open. 

She heard the clinks of him unbuckling his sword belt. There was nowhere for her to go. She was stuck in a corner.  _ He’s going to kill me. _ Elia knew what came next. Shaking, crying she shut her eyes. She could hear running and the clash of metal.  _ More men. They will all take their turns with me.  _ Elia tried to scream but it seemed as if her voice was gone. As if her life were already gone.  _ It will be soon,  _ she thought. She kept her eyes closed.  _ My child lies dead a floor above. Who knows where my Egg is? Uncle Lewyn is dead. Mother is dead. Oberyn. Doran.  _ She thought of her brothers. Of their smiles. Of Oberyn’s teasing. She thought of Baelor Breakwind and of how she laughed. 

Suddenly there was a thump beside her and an even louder one away from her. Against all her better instincts she opened her eyes. Gregor Clegane’s severed head was beside her. More men burst into the room. She did not recognise their banners so she turned her head up to see the man standing above the body. She saw the direwolf on his armour. Eddard Stark. He took the head of her would-be raper with a great two-handed sword. 

“Princess Elia,” he whispered in a harried voice as he looked at the bloodied babe beside her. Slowly he walked over to her, unclasping his cloak and wrapping it around the child next to her with tears in his eyes. “Princess Elia, I am  _ so  _ sorry.” For a time he merely stared at the babe, crying. Elia, still on the floor, cowered where she was. 

Even more men burst into the room. She whipped her head to the door. She did not recognise their banners. 

Someone pushed beside them all.  _ Jaime Lannister.  _ His own white cloak was bloodied. 

“Your Grace!” He ran to her. 

Elia got up to her feet, dazed and destroyed. All she could see was her own bloodied Rhaenys and the now faceless, innocent child. 

“Martyn, please” Eddard Stark cleared his throat. “Please empty the room.” His eyes never left the child in his arms. His icy eyes released their watery burdens.  _ Not unlike me,  _ she thought. Yet cry as she may, she felt as if she were not really in this room. As if Jaime Lannister had not wrapped her in his own bloodied cloak to hide the rip in her dress. No, she felt as if she were watching what transpired. As if she were not the one who lost her baby girl and had been there while that monster threw around the child like a ragdoll Rhaenys may have carried with one hand while chasing after her kitten.  _ I didn’t even know his name.  _ Even with her distant gaze, she noticed Eddard Stark walk away with the child he cradled. He stopped by the cot and placed the child there.

“Did you know of this?” he shouted at Jaime. “

“No! I killed Aerys for wanting to burn this city. I killed him to save lives not harm them!”

_ Aerys is dead.  _ “I wouldn’t have-”

“Where were you when they killed my daughter?” she cried, finding her voice. 

Jaime Lannister’s face fell. 

“Where were you when they killed-“ she sobbed silently, the sound would not pass her throat so she looked at the brains on the floor. Jaime Lannister gasped. His mouth fell open in shock. 

Elia walked away from him, picked up the cloaked child and left the room. In a daze she put one foot in front of the other and walked, unsure of her destination. Around her, men battled. Those of the North and those of the Westerlands. 

_ My child is gone. What if they didn’t get Aegon out on time?  _ Her eyes were looking but completely unseeing. Somewhere in the distance she thought she could hear Eddard Stark’s voice. What he said she couldn’t say. 

She could hear Jaime Lannister ordering the men of the Westerlands to put down their swords. A whisper in the wind. The loudest sound  _ she  _ could hear was the ringing in her ears. The other sounds that played in her mind were the howling of the baby and then the sudden silence; that and the silence. The silence of Rhaenys.  _ She must have died from the first fall of his sword.  _

One foot in front of the other she continued to walk. The northmen parted, heads bowed allowing her to walk. Up the stairs she went. One foot in front of the other, until she got to Rhaegar’s room. Rhaenys still lay on the bed. Elia Martell lied down, clutched both children and sobbed. 

She must have sobbed until she stopped breathing for when Elia woke up the children were gone.

“Where are-“ she started, jumping up.

“They’re here, Princess.” Eddard Stark was sitting in between two cots, head bowed. When he looked up at her he was red of face and red of eye.

“Princess Elia, I am so sorry,” he croaked. “I was too late. I saw them climbing up the tower walls. I tried to make it. I...I-“ his words gave way for weeping. Elia herself wasn’t sure she had any more tears left.

“What will they do to me?” 

“Princess,” he said, softly. “The men who did this will pay. I swear it. I am  _ so  _ sorry.” He put his face back in his hands.  _ He’s even younger than Oberyn,  _ she realised.

“I had no idea,” he continued. “I followed the remnants of Aerys’ men who left The Trident but I did not know the Lannisters were coming. I swear it,” he pleaded looking up at her, “I swear that I meant no harm to befall your children. I stood against Aerys to stop the murder of children. I-“

Elia watched the young lord cry. On any other day she might have comforted someone who wept so openly but her soul was gone. They took her children. 

“What will they do with me?”

“I am here,” he replied, “to make sure no harm comes to you. My men are outside. I do not want to leave this room until Robert arrives and sees to the punishment of those who harmed you.”

He was true to his word, he had not moved away from his spot until the darkness of night fell over them. One of his men arrived to tell them that Robert Baratheon had arrived. 

“Princess Elia,” he said, gently, “Who apart from Gregor Clegane harmed you and your children.”

“Amory Lorch. He…” she gulped, “he killed Rhaenys.”

He called two of his men in the room. “This is Martyn Cassel and this is Lord Howland Reed of Greywater Watch.” Elia remembered seeing the shorter man at Harrenhal. “There are no two men I trust more. I will leave them to guard you.”

She nodded at the northern lord and stood up to go through Rhaegar’s belongings, trying to find herself something else to cover her but the bloodied Kingsguard cloak of Jaime Lannister. 

Elia clutched her own cloak harder. She had found her own cloak, her maiden cloak, in Rhaegar’s belongings. When she came back into the bed chambers-proper she realised that the children had been moved. They were not in the cots anymore. She ran out of the room barefoot. The crannogman and the other were there. 

“My children!”

“Lord Eddard has taken them to the throne room.”

Elia ran, she ran as fast as she could.

“They killed the children!” she heard the usually soft-spoken Northerner shout. 

“Dragonspawn,” she heard Robert Baratheon drawl in his reply. She would never forget his abrasive voice. 

“It is murder! Is  _ this  _ what we rose for?” Ned Stark cried out. “This man killed Princess Rhaenys!” It was then that Elia noticed Amory Lorch on his knees. Jaime Lannister stood beside his father. Varys and Pycelle too were in the room as were many other lords.

“Did you see him kill the girl?”

“Princess Elia says he killed the child.”

“She  _ would _ look for someone to blame. Perhaps she killed them herself in fear for them.”

Elia wanted to strangle the man herself.  _ Why would I harm a child?  _ She wanted to shout and scream but no voice would come out of her.

“Is that all you have to say for yourself?” Ned Stark marched up to the man she presumed must be king now. “They killed a child of an age with your Mya...is that  _ really _ what you have to say for yourself?” his voice broke at the end. “The man needs to die as should the one who gave the order.” He turned his head to Tywin Lannister. “Where were you on the battlefield? You sacked the city after deceiving its inhabitants. I caught your man attempting to rape the princess!”

“Those were not my orders. I ordered my men to secure the children. Their orders were to present the children to our new king.”

Elia knew then that he was the man who gave the order. As did Eddard Stark who continued to berate the man who claimed to be king until he accepted that Amory Lorch should die. Eddard Stark swung the sword himself. It was only when he looked up to the gallery that he noticed her. He immediately lowered his eyes. 

“The Kingslayer must be sent to the Wall.”

This time he was rebuffed. 

“You dishonour yourself,” Eddard Stark scowled and picked up the baby. He bent down to pick up Rhaenys’ body when Robert Baratheon said, “Leave them.”

Eddard Stark picked up Rhaenys anyway, laid her head upon his shoulder and stared down the man who called himself king.

“I said. Leave them!” Robert Baratheon bellowed. “Their ashes are to be interred at the Great Sept of Baelor.”

Eddard Stark looked up at Elia.  _ Is he waiting for me to say something?  _ Elia nodded. Why she did so she did not know. The northern lord placed the children on the Small Council table. 

“I will leave to lift the siege at Storm’s End and I will have  _ my  _ men return Princess Elia to her home. I will not have her left in the hands of these...butchers,” he spat, glowering at the Lannister lord and his son. There was a finality to his words that had cowed even the now king. Jon Arryn had whispered into his ear until he nodded.

Elia walked out of the hall in the company of the two northerners Stark had left with her. 

“Princess,” he said softly when he saw her. “I do not agree with any of what happened here and I cannot stay in such company. I mean to ride for a Storm’s End and if you would allow it, I will send my most trusted men with you. They will see you safely home to Sunspear. I would like to return you home myself but I need to-“

“I’m ready to leave now  _ with you _ if you wish, my lord. I will accompany you to Storm’s End, and then to Dorne where you may find what you are looking for.”

Eddard Stark stared blankly at her. “Not here,” she whispered. “I will tell you on the road.” Rhaegar had told her the girl was not to blame for the child.

He nodded. “We will leave in the morning. In the meantime, I will guard your door myself while you pack up. I can make no excuses for the man I once knew to be my brother.”

The next morning Elia, on her sand steed, rode beside the Lord of Winterfell on his destrier. “Princess, we have a carriage ready for you.”

“I will let you know when I require it.” 

That day Elia rode upon her horse until the night. She was saddle sore and exhausted but for once she felt something.

After the second day she began riding in the carriage. The little crannogman always rode beside her. By the fifth day she began speaking to him. He was a shy man, not at all like her brothers. By the eighth day she actually laughed with Martyn Cassel, a more jovial man. For a few moments her grief had lifted. All day the two of them would ride beside her. They ensured she ate and made sure they made frequent stops so she could have comfort breaks. 

Every day on the march she watched Eddard Stark closely. There were camp followers all around but every night as he sat by the campfires he did not look at a single one of them. His gaze was always on the fire and then he would retire. 

Elia knew what, or rather who, preoccupied her thoughts. Whenever she looked at him she saw her brother Doran. The northern lord was so much younger but he had the same pensiveness her brother had. Ashara had said his brother had to ask her to dance on his behalf. She wondered whether he knew about the child they lost.

The night before they got to Storm’s End she walked across the fires to him. 

“My lord,” she greeted him.

“Princess.” He had a haggard look about him. As if he carried the weight of all the world’s troubles on his shoulders.  _ He lost his father and brother and his sister is lost to him as well. _

“Thank you, my lord,” Elia finally said. “For everything you’ve done.”

“It wasn’t enough, my lady. I was too late.” When she looked at him she could see him chewing his lower lip as tears welled in his eyes. It was a feeling she knew well and she felt him to be sincere. She saw it in how irate he was over the deaths of the children and Lord Howland Reed and Martyn Cassel had been her shadows since the moment he broke into Maegor’s Holdfast. He had saved her life and stood up for her and the children when no one else had. Not even Jaime, who had only spoken to her once. 

“Walk with me, my lord.” She didn’t know how to approach the conversation so she decided to say things as plainly as she could. “Your sister is, or was pregnant.”

He sighed loud and hard.

“I do not think she was raped,” she added. “I-“ she sighed herself, “I believe she might have gone with him herself...Rhaegar had read this prophecy that made him believe he needed to have a third child. A daughter.  _ Visenya.  _ I couldn’t…” She cleared her throat. “I couldn’t give him that child. He said something about a song of ice and fire. You are of the North. Perhaps he truly did fall in love with her.” Elia knew she was babbling. “Lord Stark,” she said, turning to face him. “I do not...want what happened to my children to happen to your sister’s. Robert Baratheon will not stop until he sees all the... _ dragonspawn  _ gone.” She knew he knew she was right. He exhaled and held the bridge of his nose. “We will not go to Sunspear but to Skyreach. Lord Fowler is a friend to my brothers-“

“My lady, what are you saying?”

“Your sister is in Dorne. In a tower near the Red Mountains. Take only the men you trust and then send your sister to Essos with the Kingsguard he left her with. Arthur will never let any harm come to her nor Oswell nor Ser Gerold.”

Eddard Stark looked at her as if she grew a second head. 


	2. Elia

**Elia - 283 AC**

Elia had paid close attention to the northern lord. She had been travelling in his party for weeks now. First on the road to Storm’s End, then briefly in the ancient castle itself, through the Storm Lands and then finally by sea as well.

_Ashara would have been happy with him. Ashara might have been the only person to see the shy lord laugh easily. Perhaps he did laugh before his life was turned upside down._

Ned Stark, as she learned those who knew him well called him, prioritised her comfort constantly and kept Martyn Cassel and Howland Reed by her side always. When one had to rest, the other guarded her. There would be others but he always had the two he saw her talk to most by her side. Sometimes Ethan Glover kept her company. He had been one of the men who travelled to King’s Landing with Brandon Stark. The only one to survive. She remembered seeing him the day Brandon Stark died. The squire had watched silently, in as much shock as Elia herself. He was of an age with Eddard Stark and kindly spoken. He had recently learnt that during the war his father had died and that _he_ was now Lord of Deepwood Motte. Elia knew the castle was in the North but nothing more. He was a handsome man, tall and broad and brown-eyed. The two of them developed a quiet companionship forged in the horror of the things only they, in this party, had witnessed. 

Their other companion was Theo Wull, a man whose faith in Eddard Stark was unwavering. They all called him Buckets for the sigil of his house. When Elia told him she had never heard of House Wull, he simply laughed and said, “We’re more a clan than a House but the Starks call us one out of respect.” He had a thick accent Elia struggled to understand but he had a laugh that could make her laugh. She had forgotten what laughter was after Rhaenys and the baby and Uncle Lewyn, her protector. Theo Wull and Martyn Cassel, who was of an age with her uncle, had reminded her what it meant to smile again. Who would have thought after Arthur and Oswell, a bunch of northern men would be the ones to make her smile again? 

Eddard Stark, on the other hand, did not laugh as loud as his men. Though she did see him smile over the fires some nights. She learned from Martyn, and his son, Jory, earlier on in their march that he did not really know his bride. He spent only a few days before going to war with her. He learned during the war that she was with child. By now he would have a son he had never held. 

She wondered how one so young could carry so many burdens. Then she would remember that she herself wasn’t as ancient as she felt. She wondered one night on the ship whether he knew about his lost babe with Ashara. Then she wondered what good it would do to heap grief upon his already heavy grief. She knew herself what it was to lose a child. 

Her mind went to her Aegon. She had entrusted her child with the eunuch who whispered in the Mad King’s ear. _Would he send him to Rhaella at Dragonstone?_ _Rhaella would not let anything happen to Aegon_. Elia would have preferred her baby was sent to her brothers. He would grow up with his cousins:Obara and Arianne, Nymeria and Tyene and the youngest, Quentyn. He would know the love of family and Oberyn would never let any harm come to her child. Nor would Doran. Alas, Varys said it was too dangerous and that was that. 

Elia felt as if her heart was flailing between grief and hope and grief once more as sure as the ship rocked up and down in the waves beneath her. Her baby boy was somewhere and she had no idea whether he was hungry or in pain or wondering where his mother was with her familiar smell and songs. _Would he forget my face?_

Elia wished her brothers were here. Doran who was more a father and Oberyn who was her other half. She could not think of Oberyn without thinking of the hot-blooded Brandon Stark. She worried what her brother would do when he heard what happened to his niece and what supposedly befell his nephew. She hoped that her raven would get to him before the news. She couldn’t have written to him at Storm’s End. They had eaten all the animals they could find during the siege. All the while, the Tyrells and the Redwynes feasted outside their walls. Feast they might have and mighty they might have thought themselves, yet when the man she learnt was called the _Quiet Wolf_ arrived, they dipped their banners in surrender before he could reach them. 

In the end, she sent her brother a raven from Griffin’s Roost, wondering what became of Jon Connington, the man who barely hid his distaste of her. Sometimes, she thought that he saw her as competition for Rhaegar’s love. _Well the egg is on both of our faces, dear Jon. He chose a child over both of us. And now the man who beat you is with me in your castle._

Her words to her brothers were brief. _I’m alive. Lord Eddard Stark saved my life. Please do not act without me. Soar fast, dear brothers. I too will soar to the sky before the sun. Your dear sister, Elia Nymeros Martell._

Elia hoped her brothers would read her message and know to go to Skyreach, home of the Fowlers whose words were _Let me soar._ There was so much more that she wanted to say in the letter but ravens could get lost...and worse...they could get shot down. She wanted to tell her brothers Aegon might be, should be alive but how to do that when she saw the result of what awaited _dragonspawn_ ? Along her worries for her own son were her worries for whatever child Lyanna Stark herself had. If any. The girl was little more than a child herself. When Elia had Rhaenys she remained abed for half a year. _What if the girl had similar issues? What will become of her and her child?_ Elia had advised Eddard Stark to send his sister to Essos. She knew Arthur and Oswell would not bend the knee to Robert Baratheon whatever came and she did not think Ashara would survive her brother’s death. Perhaps what they needed was a purpose. Perhaps this child...or Aegon. Elia would want men she could count on by her son’s side. Who knew who the eunuch served? She wondered whether she too could disappear after her son. 

She heard knocking on the cabin door. “Princess Elia, the food is ready. Would you like to join us or would you like to eat alone?”

“A moment please, Lord Glover,” she smiled when she opened the door. “I will join you.” 

The once squire, now lord, smiled shyly at her. He told her he was yet to get used to the name so she had taken to calling him the title. Every time she did, he blushed like a maid and she found she couldn’t stop. 

Once the siege was broken, when Eddard Stark said he needed a ship to sail him to Dorne, Ser Stannis Baratheon had directed them to a smuggler who prevented Storm’s End from starving. For that, the man had lands waiting for him upon his return. 

Supper this night was hardbread and salt beef. “I’m sorry, for more of the same, Princess,” Ned Stark apologised.

“There is no need to apologise, my lord. Food is food.” 

“Princess, now, granted I never knew many princesses,” Theo Wull began, wiping his mouth, “but you were not what I expected of a princess.”

That made her laugh. “Whatever do you mean Buckets?” 

“Well… it’s just,” he said, licking his fingers, “you’ve eaten as we have and travelled as we have and made no complaints.”

“I would be dead if it were not for you all,” she reminded them. The smiles died on their lips as she said that. “After that, complaining about food seems too trivial a thing for a walking corpse.”

“I am sorry I could not make it in time,” Ned Stark apologised - for what felt like the millionth time. Elia Martell squeezed his hand. She had been travelling with him and his men for six weeks by now. 

“I hope _we_ can make it in time.” He nodded in recognition of what she meant. Perhaps he could save his nephew or niece. She thought the man deserved a silver lining after the dark cloud that settled above his life. So few had known loss upon loss in such a short period of time. 

When she had asked him to only ask those he trusted to come with him to Dorne, he selected Ethan Glover, who Ned said _was more of a brother to Brandon than I was,_ Howland Reed, who considered Lyanna a friend of his, Martyn Cassel, who Ned said was his father’s most loyal man, and finally Theo Wull, the man of the mountains who had saved Ned Stark’s life during the war. Whatever they met at the tower along the Prince’s Pass, Ned Stark was sure that these men would not betray him. 

That night she taught them all how to play cyvasse and even saw Ned Stark laugh. She shared stories of Oberyn and for every wild story of her brother she learned something just as wild about Brandon Stark.

She told them of how she laughed when her brother decided that he was going to join the citadel. “I told him that I would be a better septa than he could ever be a maester. For one, I was never found in bed with my foster father’s paramour!” 

“What?” Theo Wull guffawed. 

Elia laughed until she snorted. “When Oberyn was sixteen the Lord of Yronwood found him abed with his paramour. They duelled until first blood and Doran had to send him away to the Free Cities for a time. You’d think that would mellow him out but Oberyn joined a sellsword company _and_ if that wasn’t enough he went ahead and _founded_ his own!” 

The men had laughed with her and she found that she had tears in her eyes. Of joy, of longing, of grief. “Then he came back and decided he’d join the citadel. I didn’t think he would last but he lasted long enough to forge six links of a maester’s chain…until he came to visit me one day.” Elia put on his voice and stood up, shoulders stripped back, arms flailing confidently as she walked, “Elia, I could be the greatest maester in this land but it’s just so _boring._ I am a man of the flesh, Elia. I cannot forswear women-” She did not finish the rest of the sentence for she knew not what the sensibilities of these northmen were. Yet, she saw them all laugh with her. 

In turn, Ethan Glover told her of the wildness of the _Wild Wolf_ and of all the nights the two of them had spent wenching and drinking. “Brandon could drink all day, and fuck all night,” he laughed. Everything she learned of the man made her think of Oberyn. She learned that he and his sister were as close as she was with her own brother. The more the men spoke of Brandon, the sadder Ned Stark looked. When they were all well within their cups she sat with the young lord. 

“Have you thought about what I said, my lord?” 

He stared into nothingness. “I have, my lady, and I am still unsure of what to do.” 

“My lord, my brother’s wife, Mellario’s family have lands in Norvos, perhaps they can hide her and her son there. You know as well as I that the fate that awaits the child is what befell mine.”

“I know,” he whispered. “Robert was my brother once...I... I thought him to be more of a brother to me than Brandon. I spent more years with him than my own brother,” he added tearfully. Elia learned that after the death of Lady Stark, the boys had been sent to foster elsewhere. While Brandon, and the youngest, Benjen, were fostered to Northern houses, Eddard Stark was sent to the Vale aged eight. 

“I pray that Jon will guide him to better ways. He was always the only one who could calm him.” 

Elia herself was not sure the man who had found glee in the deaths of children could ever be leashed again. “I hope so too,” she replied. “Though I think you should not leave the child to your faith in the man who was once your brother.” 

“Princess…” he said shyly, “Why do you care for my sister? You said that she went with Rhaegar of her own will.”

Elia smiled sadly. “When Rhaegar returned to King’s Landing I had thrown everything within reach at him. He had embarrassed me at Harrenhal but running away with your sister was more than any woman should cope with. Yet, I remember myself at her age. I was prone to fancy. When I was her age, my mother decided that she would find matches for Oberyn and I. We went to Starfall, the Arbor, Oldtown, the Shield Islands, Crakehall and finally Casterly Rock. I found the whole thing an enchantment, my lord. I had met many suitors. I did not fall for any of them...perhaps it was because Oberyn had made up names for all of them.” She laughed loudly. _I am so drunk._ She had to drink to mask her pain. “There was Little Lord Lazyeye, Squire Squishlips, and one he named the Whale That Walks. And then I met Ser Baelor Hightower. My lord, I thought him to be the finest knight in all the realms. Had he asked me to run away with him, I would have....well, I would have before Oberyn named him _Baelor Breakwind_ after he farted in our presence once.” She snorted. The memory made her laugh even now. She never looked at the man again without laughing. When she composed herself she finally said, “My lord, your sister is a young girl in the age of fancies. If there is anyone to blame for what has befallen both me and her it was Rhaegar. The Rhaegar lords saw was the ever dashing kind and gallant prince. Don’t get me wrong, he was all those things but an obsession with prophecy drove him mad. His _dragon_ had to have three heads. At all costs. When I had Rhaenys I was abed for six months afterwards. Yet the moment I recovered Rhaegar was adamant on exercising his husbandly rights. He had to have his Aegon _and_ his Visenya too. The second pregnancy nearly killed me. He went _travelling_ soon after the maester told him I would have no more children.” The memory was still bitter. She had felt a failure of a woman at the time. _Would he have stayed if my womb could carry one more?_ she remembered asking Ashara. “Lord Stark, your sister should not have to suffer for his recklessness.” 

“You are kinder than most, my lady.” 

The next day, they had finally reached the coast just off Skyreach. There was never a more welcome sight to her eyes than the orange banners of House Martell flapping in the wind and waiting for her. She ran off the ship, forgetting all decorum and courtesy into the waiting arms of Oberyn. “You got my raven,” she cried into his chest. 

“I did. Though Doran had to prevent me from killing Tywin Lannister and the man he crowned king.”

Elia looked up to him. “Have you lost your mind?” 

“Have you lost yours? You are travelling with the men who went to war with your husband.”

“I am only here because of them, Oberyn,” she chided him. “Speak to them well.” Her brother narrowed his eyes at her but obeyed. 

“Lord Stark,” he said, walking over to him. The other men stayed a few steps behind their liege lord. “You have my thanks for bringing my sister home. Though I wish you had brought my nephew and niece home _alive_ as well.”

“Oberyn,” she huffed, pinching him before sending an apologetic look to the Lord of Stark. _I had not prepared him for the desert storm that is my brother._

“I’m sorry, Prince Oberyn. I came too late. I had no knowledge of the Lannisters’ assault on King’s Landing. When I arrived, the City’s Gates were already open and the city was being sacked. I saw men climbing up the walls of Maegor’s Holdfast and rode as fast as I could-”

“I am only alive, thanks to Lord Stark and his men,” she interrupted. “Gregor Clegane had killed the baby and Amory Lorch...Rhaenys.” The guilt and grief rushed through her once more. “Lord Stark killed The Mountain as he unbuckled his breeches to…” Her brother tensed and turned his body to her, placing his hands around her face. 

“Elia?” he said tearfully. 

“He didn’t.” She shook her head. “Lord Stark killed him before he could and that wasn’t all Oberyn! He demanded justice on behalf of the children and he killed Amory Lorch himself.” 

The Red Viper walked to the Quiet Wolf and shaked his hand. “I will never forget this, Lord Stark, nor will Dorne. Though,” he added turning to Elia, “the head of the snake still walks. Those two men would never have acted without the orders of Tywin Lannister.” 

“On that we are agreed,” Lord Stark conceded.

“It would appear Tywin Lannister blames you, dear sister, for his daughter not becoming Rhaegar’s wife. He tried to teach you the lesson he taught the Tarbecks and the Reynes.”

_The young Lord Tarbeck was Rhaenys’ age and as far as they know they killed both my children in return for Aerys choosing me instead of Cersei Lannister._

“Lord Fowler has extended to us all the hospitality of Skyreach, my lord. You and your men are invited to rest and recover here and then we will leave for Sunspear. My brother too would like to thank you properly for keeping the sun in our skies.” Oberyn had kissed her brow then. “Though I do wonder why we are meeting here instead of at Sunspear. Are you here to see Ashara? Our star has not been the same after the-”

Elia pinched her brother again. _If only mother cuffed him a few hundred more times as a child._

“Babe.” 

Elia exhaled all the air in her body. She had been reunited with her brother for all of five minutes and already she was exasperated. Perhaps if she didn’t breathe she could disappear from between them. Lord Stark’s face fell from its usual solemnity to absolute despondency.

“Ba-babe?” he stuttered.

“You didn’t know?” he asked with all the mortification of a man caught in bed with a lord’s paramour. 

_No Oberyn. He did not and now you have added devastation upon his devastation._ Elia narrowed her eyes at her brother.

“My lord, I apologise,” she managed to whisper, staring at the ground. “I can explain later.” 

“Princess, I have a child?” His eyes teared once more.

“No, my lord,” she gulped. “Ashara lost the babe.” 

\---

“Let me get this right? Rhaegar’s paramour is pregnant?”

“She’s probably had the child now.” 

“So she has had his bastard and now you wish to save them?” 

“They will kill the child Oberyn! They...you have no idea what they did to…” Her daughter’s name would not pass her lips. “And the baby. Oberyn, the Mountain smashed him around as if he were a ragdoll. Tell me, would you have any child suffer that fate? It is not the child’s fault he had a mad man for a father.”

“And you are sure Aegon is alive?” 

“No. I have no news of where he is,” she snivelled. She was sitting on the floor, holding Oberyn’s hand. When they were children the two of them would sit in a corner, holding hands whenever one was sad - the other would comfort them. There was only a year’s difference between their births so they were more like twins than anything else. 

“Fine. Say we find the girl. Where will we take her?” 

“Essos. Between you and Doran, I am sure you will find somewhere for her and her child. Perhaps…” she felt stupid for thinking it, “perhaps she could look after my Egg until I can join him myself.” 

“You are mad,” Oberyn laughed. 

Elia left her brother once she had changed to find Ned Stark. He didn’t appear to take the news well at all. Skyreach was an ancient castle, carved into the stone that overlooked the Prince’s Pass. Kingsgrave was closer to the tower they sought but they could get to Skyreach faster. The river flowed here from the Sea of Dorne and west past Yronwood. Time was of the essence for them and travelling by sea was faster than by land. 

She found him sitting in the godswood of the castle. The Fowlers were of First Men descent but they had no weirwood here so close to the Red Mountains. The man had clearly sought comfort in something bigger than himself.

“Princess.” He straightened himself upon seeing her. 

“Please,” she replied, “stay as you were. I only came to check on you.” The silence waxed between them for a while. He fidgeted in his seat while she wrung her hands. “My lord,” she finally managed, “I am sorry for not saying anything...about Ashara. It wasn’t for Oberyn to say anything either. I did not want to add any grief to your own.” 

“I did not know, princess,” he rasped. “I-I,” he smiled the saddest smile Elia had ever seen. “I never thought she would be interested in me. I was too shy to approach her myself. Ashara was the most beautiful woman in the room and-”

“I will take no offence,” she grinned, looking at his blushing face. 

“Princess,” he said startled, “I meant no offence.”

“I know, I know Lord Stark.” She tapped his hand. “Please continue.” 

He smiled at her. “Ashara was more beautiful than anything my dreams could conjure up. That she agreed to dance with me was more than anything I could have hoped for. My brother, Brandon, had an easy way with women. Brandon was better than me at everything. He was more handsome, funnier, better company…” He gazed up at the night sky. Elia joined him in doing the same. “Yet of all the company at that tourney, Ashara chose to spend that night with me. Nothing untoward happened, mind,” he was keen to add. “We merely walked and talked and sat in the godswood that night. She listened to me as I spoke, never boring of me. In turn, I listened as _she_ spoke, entranced by the beautiful woman in front of me. I was half in love with her by the end of the tourney. When my father returned to Winterfell, I, as you must know, stayed longer in the Riverlands with her before my return to the Vale. And we met once more a few months later when she travelled with Lord Dayne to the Tourney at Gulltown.” 

“I remember. I had just given birth to Egg and enjoyed all the gossip when she returned to me at Dragonstone,” she needled him as he reddened. She found him an easy man to talk to and an even easier one to tease. Northmen for all their reputation as brutes she found were the shiest men she met. _Or perhaps this lord surrounds himself with those too much like him._ Only Ethan Glover could last in Dorne she thought. _Him and the late Stark heir._

“Princess, there was nothing more that I would have loved than to marry her but-”

“War came and you had to do what was required of you. Ashara did not like it but by the end I believe she understood.” 

“How far gone was she?” 

“Not very far, my lord.” 

“It is too late for me to do anything about it, but I loved her,” he whispered at the stars no doubt seeing his own fallen one.

**\----**

Elia had insisted on travelling with them to the small tower on the Prince’s Pass. “I am not a glass object, Oberyn!” she shouted at her brother when he told her to stay at Kingsgrave with Lord Dagos Manwoody. Elia had been born premature and had never been the healthiest, but she would not be left behind. In the end her brother relented. Sometimes her blood was as fiery as his, and when one got too close to the sun they burned. _Arthur, Oswell and Gerold will listen to none but me._

They rode for hours in the hot Dornish sun. The northerners began to melt as their sand silks stuck to them like a lover’s embrace - though not as welcome. The desert air was dry during the day. They passed through small hidden valleys and high meadows with sweet and green grass. Thankfully, their nights were cooler and they were blessed with a crisp Dornish breeze that the Northerner’s welcomed more than most. 

“Princess, your people...all look different,” Theo Wull said one night, no doubt comparing her to the Fowlers and the Manwoodys. Dorne had four main peoples. The _Salty Dornishmen_ who like her, hailed from along the Dornish coast. They were olive-skinned, dark-eyed and dark haired owing to their Rhoynish heritage. Then there were those of First Men descent like the Fowlers and the Daynes. They were more likely to resemble the Andals and the First Men than the other Dornish peoples. They were called the _Stony Dornishmen_ on account of their residence in the mountains and along the mountain passes of Dorne. The third group were an even darker skinned folk than the Salty Dornishmen. They were called the _Sandy Dornishmen_ due to their inhabitation of the deserts of Dorne. Their faces were said to be burnt by the sun. The last group were the orphans of the Greenblood - the descendants of the Rhoynish who travelled to Dorne with Queen Nymeria. They were the descendants of those who regretted the burning of the ships. They held no love for the dry, red land that they had come to. In mourning for their homeland, they refused to intermarry with the natives, choosing to stick with their own. They called themselves orphans for they were cut off from their sacred river, The Mother Rhoyne. Elia’s mother had once told her that they had hammered new boats together from the hulks and carcasses of the burnt ships. And now all these centuries later, they still poled beautiful carved boats up and down The Greenblood, the river they renamed Mother Rhoyne, as their people had in their homeland. 

At Kingsgrave, the Northerners were served a Dornish spiced supper of lamb, stuffed grape leaves, flatbread, white cheese and olives as well as flatbread with spiced chickpea paste and purple olives, stuffed peppers with cheese and onion and creamcakes for dessert to be washed down with sour Dornish wine. 

“Princess,” Martyn Cassel coughed after the spice touched the back of his throat, “Why would anyone eat this much spice while living in the dessert? This is torture.” His teary-eyed, red-nosed companions seemed to agree. 

She shared a wine skin with Lord Glover another night but had stopped the moment she saw Oberyn’s eyes bearing into him. The young lord deserved better than her brother’s barbs. She did not want to hear what name he’d coin for him. By now the Northerners had been her companions for nearly two months. She had grown to enjoy their company. 

She saw their billowing white cloaks first. Three mountains stood in front of a tower. _They saw us before we saw them._

Elia insisted on approaching the Kingsguard alone. _They might listen to me if they know Aegon is alive._ Oberyn refused to leave her and so he came with her as her flagbearer holding the orange banner marked by the sun and spear of House Martell.

“Princess!” They all bowed at once. “You’re alive.”

“I am,” she said tiredly. “Rhaegar told me where to find you.” With those words she knew that they had already known their prince was dead. The tower was along the Prince’s Pass and the main road from Dorne into The Reach. She wondered whether they had seen some traders. Though it would be stupid of them to make themselves known with their white cloaks of the Kingsguard. She saw Oswell craning his neck to get a better look of her companions.

“I am here with Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell who has come to collect his sister.”

“Prince Rhaegar told us to keep her safe and to keep her here.”

“Do you keep her safe from her own brother?”

All three of them stared at the desert ground. Questioning orders had never been something they took well. 

“Princess,” The White Bull finally said, “our orders were to keep Lady Lyanna and the boy safe.”

For a moment Elia nearly laughed. A boy. _Your Visenya was a boy._

“The man who gave you your orders is dead Ser Gerold and the man who sits upon the throne revelled in the deaths of my children. Now, how long do you think the three of you will be able to keep the identity of this boy secret when you stand here in your Kingsguard garb?”

“The little princess and Egg?”

“My daughter is dead,” Elia lamented before clearing her throat. “But your king is not. The eunuch took Egg away. I know not where. If you seek to serve your prince, step aside. Ned Stark will not leave here without seeing his sister and you will not leave here without obeying your vows to serve. So serve. Serve my son, wherever he is. He will need good men to protect him from the monster that sits the throne. If you must, you will take the girl in that tower with you and protect _both_ your prince’s sons.”

Arthur turned his eyes to Oberyn probably expecting him to object but her brother simply stood sentry. She had words with him earlier. 

“No one knows Aegon is alive,” she added. “No one but me, the four of you and Varys. Now, please step aside for Lord Stark to see his sister. We will determine what comes next when he does.”

“Princess, Lady Lyanna is…” Arthur sadly trailed off. 

“What is it?”

“The midwife says she has lost too much blood.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know not too much happened here but I’m still finding my feet.  
> Elia is captain of the Ashara/Ned ship. Move along Allyria & little Ned lol.  
> Oberyn actually did join the citadel for a while AND he did have to duel with Lord Yronwood after being caught in bed with the lord’s paramour, AND he did indeed set up his own sellsword company lmao. I presume he did this all while Elia was alive because it is said he hardly left Dorne after her death.  
> Ethan Glover was Brandon’s squire. His age is unknown so I’ve made him of an age with Ned. He survived the Mad King only to die at the Tower of Joy. I’ve decided to keep him alive & thought Ned should go to Dorne with the four most trustworthy guys. I wouldn’t trust anyone married to the snake that is Lady Dustin and I didn’t know what Mark Ryswell’s relation to her was, even if Ned said he was gentle-hearted lol.  
> It’s not clear what Ethan’s relationship with Galbart is so I’ve decided to make him the older brother.  
> Up next, probably on the weekend, is a Ned chapter. After that, I think we have one more Elia chapter before a time skip - though I know not what to do with said time skip...


	3. Eddard

**Eddard - 283 AC**

Ned was bewitched by the perfect velvet darkness of the night sky adorned as it was by stars so bright they drew eyes sky bound. They were both guiding lights in a sea of black and, for Ned, most importantly, they were the promise of a dawn to come. After what felt like a year-long night, Ned felt as if a dawn awaited him on the morrow. The sun would bring with it a reunion with Lyanna. After so many losses, seeing his sister again would be like finding an oasis in the desert that had become his life. He wondered how much of what befell them was his fault. If he had not pushed the betrothal with Robert would any of this have happened? _Father would be alive, so would Brandon. Benjen wouldn’t have lost everything and Lyanna...Lyanna might not have chosen the silver prince if she didn’t despair of her options._ _Prince Rhaegar’s children too would still be alive and today he might have been king._

His last conversation with his sister had been heated. He had tried to extoll the good qualities of Robert Baratheon as the man wenched brazenly. She had reminded him of a conversation they’d had long before that night. A conversation they had on the night when Father had promised her hand to the brother Ned chose as his own. 

_“Robert will never keep to one bed. I hear he has gotten a child on some girl in the Vale.” Ned had held the babe in his arms; he could scarcely deny her, nor would he lie to his sister, but he had assured her that what Robert did before their betrothal was of no matter, that he was a good man and true who would love her with all his heart. Lyanna had only smiled. “Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature.”_

At Harrenhal, “Do you remember my words?” she asked him one night as she watched Robert dip his face between a serving wench’s bosom. “ _That_ ” she pointed, “is what you’d have me marry.” She scowled in disgust before she strode out. He had ran after her saying weakly, “He is just drunk and upset that you refused to dance with him.”

“I will not marry the man,” she said with a conviction that threw him back. His sister had an iron will whenever she made a decision and none could turn her back. None but Father. 

“You cannot break a betrothal Lyanna. Everything has been agreed. Robert will be faithful to you. You are my sister and he would not dishonour you as his wife.”

“You care for him.”

“He is like a brother to me.”

“And I’m your sister,” she shouted tearfully, throwing her arms in the air. Then softly she whimpered, “I am your sister but you choose him over me. What about my happiness? Does it mean so little to you?”

Ever since Rhaegar ran away with Lyanna that conversation replayed in Ned’s mind. He remembered the red ribbon on her wrist and the way it blew in the wind when she raised her hand to point at the Hall they’d left. He remembered the tears in her eyes and the sad lilt in her voice when she asked _what about my happiness?_ He remembered the way his feet rooted him to the ground as she walked away in the direction of the godswood. He stood there for more than an hour that night wondering what he could do to fix his sister's heart. He remembered marching back in the Hall, dragging Robert out and dipping his head in a bucket of cold water before berating him. 

“You would do this in front of your betrothed? My sister?”

“I promise I will stop Ned,” he attested as he wiped the water off his face. “I will never stray from her bed when we marry. You don’t see how she avoids me Ned and what it does to me. I promise I will never stray from her. I love Lyanna.” 

Had Ned placed his sister’s happiness above Robert's, would she be with child and alone in a desert in Dorne? If he had never mentioned his sister’s name to Robert, would he have felt the need to love someone he’d never known? Ned left home at the age of eight for The Eyrie. Lyanna was only four. Over visits home and letters he got to know the sister that was unlike any woman he’d ever met. As children, Lyanna and Benjen were one another’s shadows. She’d wear Benjen’s clothes to play swords with him in the godswood. She could ride as if she came out of the womb with the knowledge and her wolf blood made her both the darling of their household, for she had Brandon’s easy way of entering people’s hearts, and a gust of unstoppable force when the madness called to her. Each time he came home, Ned returned to the Vale with new stories of his sister and his family. For Robert, who knew so little of what family meant, perhaps Lyanna was the promise of the happiness that died on the day Robert watched his parents drown off Shipbreaker Bay. Robert had never been the same again after that. He gave way to drinking and wenching as a way to fill the hole left in his heart. Ned remained searching for the brother he had before that and foolishly, he thought Lyanna may heal his hurts. _Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature._

What kind of brother was he? Lyanna had told Benjen that she was running away with the Prince because she thought Ned and Brandon would only give her up to Robert Baratheon had they known.

“I didn’t know it was going to kill Father and Brandon,” Benjen had cried. “I only saw Lyanna’s tears. I...wanted to help her.” 

That Benjen saw what he failed to see made him feel even more foul. Ned had been searching for the brother he knew so much so that he had not taken a hard, close look at the man he had become. His dismissal of the deaths of Princess Elia’s children had enraged Ned until he could no longer stay in the same city as the man he had once loved. He had almost been expecting Robert to come in, speaking of his regret. That’s how they had always been. Robert would stumble and then he’d stand again but he had not this time. They did not speak after what happened in the throne room. The Lannister boy should have been sent to the Wall and Tywin Lannister should have died along with his men. Such a man could not be trusted. At least the Lords of Redwyne, Tyrell and Rowan bent the knee _after_ they had stood with their liege. There was no honour in a man who held back his troops until he was sure of the winner. That he would sack a city by treachery and then have the prince’s children and the princess raped to show his loyalty made him even more untrustworthy. That Robert failed, no that he refused to see that boggled Ned. _Lyanna was my sister, if anyone should feel offended it was me._

He felt a wretched man, a wretched son, a wretched brother, a wretched father and a worse husband. He had a living son waiting for him in Riverrun, yet it was the grief of a lost child and a lost love that sat like a stone in his heart. Lady Catelyn Tully was a courteous lady; one he was sure would do her duty to her lord and husband but he knew her heart lied with Brandon. She had known Brandon. He heard that the girl was head over heels for his dashing brother. She had never met Ned until the day of their wedding and even then try as she might he could still see the disappointment in her eyes. Even in death, Brandon’s ghost loomed heavily over him. He would never be good enough, never be handsome enough, never be lovable enough.

Ned turned his eye to the brightest star in the sky and smiled sadly. For once in his life he thought fate had smiled on him when he met Ashara. She burned brighter than any woman he had ever seen. Fair skinned, dark haired and purple of eye, she had a quick wit and a laughter that made Ned’s heart sing. And she had chosen him. For once in his life, someone had seen him. Not Robert or Brandon or even his Stark name. She’d seen Ned, the man, and loved him though everything said she shouldn’t. She was loud and he was not, she was beautiful and he was not, she was friendly with everyone and he was not. Yet, when he was with her none of that mattered. All that mattered was them and the little slice of happiness they’d found together. He remembered the days just before the Mad King had killed Father. When she heard he was coming for the tourney, she insisted on joining him though so few from Court were in attendance. They met on the last night she was in Gulltown with her brother, the Lord Dayne of Starfall. That night they’d joined together as man and woman, on the promise that once he spoke to his father he would seek her hand in marriage. He was shy and so was the ever vivacious Ashara. They were both drunk on the promise of a future. When she lay in his arms after the deed speaking of a future they would now never have, he remembered thinking that he had never been happier in his life. 

When the Mad King demanded his head and he was escaping the Vale it was her memory that kept him sane. When Gulltown’s port was closed on the orders of Lord Marq Grafton, Ned Stark trekked the Mountains of the Moon on his return North. In the darkness and the fear, Ashara remained his solace. When he had to hide like the fugitive he was in a fisherman’s boat from the Fingers to White Harbor, he thought of how Ashara smiled when he told her of his intention to marry her. And when the storm caught them on The Bite, drowning the fisherman, Ashara remained his calm in the storm. 

Even when they rose in rebellion he kept her at the forefront of his mind and in his heart. Ashara wanted to show him the Red Mountains of Dorne, she wanted him to ride on a pole boat along the Greenblood and taste the spices of her homeland. “The spice is in our blood, Ned,” she once told him, “the sun and spices are where we get our passion for life.” He had tasted the spices and toasted in the sun now yet without her it did not hold the same attraction. 

Their end began when Randyll Tarly beat Robert at the Battle of Ashford beginning a chain of events that led to the death of the last piece of happiness Ned had in his life. With Ned moving south, Robert fled north to escape the Mad King’s men who fell upon his trail like hungry hunting dogs who’d caught the scent of a prize stag. He was hunted throughout the lands as the Targaryen loyalists tried to stop the rebel lord from reaching his friend. Robert always made friends wherever he went and Stoney Sept was no different. Injured and weary, he was hidden by the town’s residents while his injuries were seen to. 

Jon Connington, Hand of King Aerys, besieged the town before Ned could get there all while his men searched the town house by house. Any rebels he caught were hanged up in cages to show the people what happened to traitors. 

To aid the man he’d chosen as a brother, Ned needed to get more men to join their cause and none had more to offer than Lord Hoster Tully. 

Together they stormed the town while the Septon rang the bells warning the people to return to their homes. That day, they battled in the streets and alleys and on the roofs after storming the town from the walls. Robert had been hidden in the town’s brothel. When the bells started ringing, Ned heard that Robert had jumped off the woman he was lying with and into the battle. He remembered seeing him clamber out of The Peach without a tunic before he killed six men including Myles Motoon, Rhaegar’s squire, with nothing on his person but his war hammer, loosely tied breeches and boots. Jon Connington in turn, had badly wounded Lord Hoster and killed Denys Arryn, the most beloved son of the Vale. 

Robert loved to say that it was Ned who won the Battle of the Bells. He’d saved the lives of many of his friends but at the cost of himself. Lord Hoster did not want to bestir himself and risk his people’s lives without cause _._ All that was required of Ned to give a cause to Hoster Tully was to honour his brother’s betrothal. Jon Arryn was then betrothed to the other Tully daughter after the battle for he had lost both his heirs. Elbert had died with Brandon and Denys at Stoney Sept. 

Ned remembered how he twisted the knife in his own heart on the day he agreed. His dreams had then turned into ashes in the same mouth he used to swear vows in Riverrun’s sept with his new wife. Ever since then, Ashara had been as unattainable to him as the stars upon which he gazed. All the while, his wife longed for the brother who he could never match up to. And between them, Ned lost whatever he thought remained of him after Father and Brandon. Reuniting with Lyanna and then meeting the son he had never held remained the only two stars in the seemingly never ending night sky that became his life. 

The next day he rode behind Princess Elia Martell of Dorne, her princely brother and the Captain of their brother’s guards, a Norvoshi man. The man was practical if nothing else. He insisted on wearing mail made of copper but wore it under a cloak of sandsilk to keep himself from cooking. He did the same for his helm. 

Whatever they called the wolf-blood here, Oberyn Martell had it in buckets. He walked with both grace and arrogance and doted upon his sister without measure. 

As for the princess herself, he had never had the opportunity to make her acquaintance before. He expected that Rhaegar’s actions at the tourney had somewhat soured any relations they might have had - good or bad. Yet, all he heard of the quiet woman of frail health could not have prepared him for the woman’s quiet dignity and quick wit. He had heard during the war of men’s battle lust and their hot blood, but he had never been one to excuse the rape of women, war or not. He had not thought twice when he saw what the Lannister’s men had done at Maegor’s Holdfast. They had deserved to die for that. 

Sometimes in his dreams he still saw her injured children and how she carried them away and lay between their bloodied bodies when she lost consciousness. He heard her wailing before he made it to the nursery and her heartrending screams still echoed in his ears. 

For much of their march to Storm’s End she had been withdrawn and engulfed in a pit of grief. Yet slowly by slowly she had won over all his men with her grace and kindness, and in the case of the men who followed him here, with her wit and laughter. She had healed Ethan Glover on the road as much as he helped her. Ned couldn’t imagine the things only the two of them had seen when Brandon and Father died. Just the tale was too horrific for Ned. To see it must have been something else. 

That she still had the wherewithal to think of Lyanna amidst her desolation stupefied Ned beyond measure. On all accounts, she should hold no real love for him. He had fought in a war against her husband and it was only due to their winning that the Lannisters had sacked the city and felt emboldened enough to kill her children. Were it not for the war, and before that, not for Lyanna running away with the prince, Elia Martell’s life would have been so different right now. Yet here she was, riding proudly ahead of him, leading him to the girl who carried her husband’s child. The princess wanted to send Lyanna to Essos. She had repeated to Ned time and time again that her brothers could hide her. She reminded him of what had happened to her own two children.

“Your sister carries the child of his enemy. You saw how he didn’t blink an eye at the murder of my own. He had no love for me, true, but they were Rhaegar’s children and to him that was enough. Your sister was his betrothed. That child will suffer a worse fate than mine,” she stressed. 

She told him to bring with him only the men he trusted. Beside Storm’s End’s ancient weirwood tree, he had made them all swear a vow that they would take whatever they learned in Dorne with them to their graves. Ethan would never betray Brandon’s memory, Howland Reed had sworn that Lyanna had defended his honour at Harrenhal and for that he would take her secret to the grave, Martyn Cassel called her the daughter he never had and Theo Wull swore he would die before he betrayed a Stark of Winterfell. Ned only hoped that he would find his sister and her child in good health. Whatever happened after did not feature in his mind. 

He caught sight of the round tower nestled between the Red Mountains and wanted to do nothing more than gallop to his sister. He did not, out of respect for Princess Elia who asked for an opportunity to speak to the Kingsguard Rhaegar had left with Lyanna. As she rode toward them, Ned paid close attention to them. 

The hilt of the great-sword Dawn poked up over Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of the Morning’s right shoulder. Even from where he was, Ned could see Ser Oswell Whent sharpening his blade with a whetstone. Across his white-enameled helm, the black bat of his House spread its wings. Between them stood fierce old Ser Gerold Hightower, the White Bull, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. Rhaegar Targaryen had left his best men to protect Lyanna. If only he had done the same for his wife and children too. Ned found he was both grateful to and critical of the man.

He waited on his horse until his impatience got to him the moment he heard a faint scream of what he thought was his name. He galloped on his horse to where the princess stood with the knights. 

“I looked for you on the Trident,” he said to them. 

“We were not there,” Ser Gerold answered. 

“Woe to the Usurper if we had been,” said Ser Oswell. 

“When King’s Landing fell, Ser Jaime slew your king with a golden sword, and I wondered where you were. I wondered,” he added, “where you were when the Lannisters killed the innocent prince and princess.” 

“Do you hear that Os?” Ser Arthur said, “the usurper’s man seeks to berate us.” 

“Enough,” Princess Elia broke in. “Lord Stark-”

“ _Eddard!”_ he heard once more and his heart stopped, especially when he saw the anguish on Princess Elia’s face.

“What have you done to my sister?” He bellowed, his voice hoarse with alarm. 

“Lord Stark, it’s best we go upstairs,” Princess Elia said kindly. “Lady Lyanna has had a difficult birth. Perhaps Oberyn can have a look at her. He got his silver link while at the citadel.” Ned ignored them all and ran up the tower’s steps as if death itself was upon his heels. When he finally burst through the door the sight in front of him knocked the air out of his chest. Lyanna was in a bed of blood-soaked sheets, drenched in her own sweat and tears. His sister of sixteen, the child-woman of surpassing loveliness was all but drowning in her blood. 

“Ned!” she breathlessly gasped when she saw him. 

“Lya?” he whispered against her cheek when he finally knelt down beside her. “Lya, I’m here.” All around her were wilted roses. In a corner in the room a wet nurse sat with the child while a midwife wrung a bloodied cloth in water behind him. 

“I’m sorry Ned. I didn’t want Father to die or Brandon. I didn’t want any of this to happen. The prince said we could live together and that he would be good to me. Ned I just didn’t want to marry Robert, I didn’t want anyone to be hurt. I-” She fixed her eyes on the door. Ned followed her gaze to see Princess Elia standing there with her brother.

Ned cleared his throat, not once removing his hand from his sister’s. “Lya, Princess Elia brought me here to you.” He did not have the strength to lie about Prince Oberyn helping her. His sister was too clammy and he would have expected anyone who bled as she had to have already died. It was one more stone to tie to his heart. He carried five now. One for Brandon and Father, his lost child and Ashara and now, his sister. His night sky had only the one star left now. The son that awaited him in Riverrun...and perhaps, he thought as he looked at the swaddled, silent child, Lya’s too.

“Princess Elia.” Lyanna’s voice shook and her tears flowed. His sister’s hand trembled in his own. 

“Lady Lyanna,” the princess said kindly, “My brother Oberyn knows a little about healing, I thought...he might help you.” 

“Princess, I’m sorry,” Lyanna cried. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t think and I-” 

“Shush now,” the princess replied. “Let Oberyn have a look at you.” 

“Rhaegar is dead,” Lya said to him. “Robert will kill me Ned and he’ll kill the baby too. Promise me you won’t let him Ned, please promise me.” Lya held onto him tightly as she begged. “Please you have to stop him Ned, please. He will kill him.” 

Princess Elia nodded at him. “He will.” Lyanna turned her head to the princess. “He smiled at the deaths of my…” she sighed heavily. That only made Lyanna even more fearful as she turned her head between the two of them. 

“Ned, please,” she said faintly. Between her legs, Oberyn Martell's arms were covered in blood. He looked up at Ned and shook his head. The torrent of grief he had carried with him welled up to course down his face while Lya mumbled incoherently through her hands and choked sobs. 

“I don’t want to die, Ned,” she cried. “Not really. I want to go home to Winterfell, Ned. I want to see Benjen and Old Nan and Hodor. I want to ride with Harwin and Jory. Ned, please, promise me you’ll take me back. Please, promise me. I want to go to the crypts and see Father and Brandon. Please, Ned.” 

Every word that came out of her lips felt like another stab wound in the place where his heart should have been. Ned did not think he would survive this. He thought he would die in this tower in Dorne with his sister. 

The child was placed in his arms on Lyanna’s request. He was a quiet child, grey-eyed and brown of hair. His grey eyes so much like his own and Lyanna’s and Brandon’s and Father’s and generations of Starks before them, bore into him.

“Ned, please, promise me you won’t let him take my baby. Please, protect him Ned. I beg of you. Ned, I’m your sister. You have to remember that. Robert Baratheon will kill him. Please, Ned.” She sobbed and sobbed and he saw Princess Elia bite her fist as she was racked by her own silent whimpers. She had turned to look away from Lyanna.

“Ned,” his sister whispered faintly. “Please take me home. Bury me with Father and Brandon and let no harm come to my boy. Promise me, Ned. Please. Princess, please forgive me.” 

Ned lost all concept of time after that. In one arm he held his sister’s boy and his other hand still clutched hers. He stared at their joined hands for what felt like an age. At some point Howland Reed had walked into the room followed by the rest of his men. Martyn collapsed to his knees and Howland gently walked to him, separating Ned’s hands from his now dead sister’s. He had no recollection of what happened next. He had a faint memory of the princess holding the child, of the wet nurse feeding him and of the tower being ripped down. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:
> 
> I know we meet Lord Eddard Stark in AGOT, a man with a quiet sense of sureness about who he is. I wanted to explore the 20 year old Lord who all of a sudden carried this increasingly heavier burden upon his shoulders - one he had never expected to carry as a second son. 
> 
> Side note: Ned Stark is a low-key fashionista which is absolutely hilarious to me. You hardly get a Ned chapter where he’s not describing someone’s clothes lmao. Although, I don’t particularly feel very jovial after writing this chapter. Maybe I should only write my notes after I write a chapter rather than during. 
> 
> I think actually we could do with one more Ned chapter before another Elia or maybe we’ll have them both. Elia first then Ned again
> 
> Ps: thank you all for the love you're showing this story!


	4. Elia

**Elia - 283 AC**

Arthur had told her that the girl had lost too much blood. She heard her desperate scream for her brother before he jumped off his horse and dashed up the steps to the top of the tower. Elia herself had taken cautious steps, fearful of what she may see when she made it up there, unsure of whether she even had any place there. _ Oberyn might help.  _ Her brother’s viper eyes told her it wasn’t his preference. He had been offended beyond measure when Rhaegar had crowned the girl at Harrenhal. The thought of her brother taking offence at a man having another lover would almost be funny if tragedy didn’t await them upstairs. 

Arthur’s face was blanched, Os avoided her eyes and Ser Gerold, the White Bull, who so often was the strength upon which Rhaella leaned looked at her sadly. Elia knew before she made it up the steps that those looks meant that no good end awaited the girl. Those were the looks they had on their faces when Aerys beat his wife and took her forcefully. They were the looks they had when he burnt people in his throne room. Ser Gerold would say that it was not for the Kingsguard to judge their king and yet the fiercest of them walked under a dark cloud of gloom. Still, he carried it better than the other two. The expressions they carried now were the same ones they had on their faces when Aerys strong armed his way to attending the Tourney of Harrenhal where Rhaegar hoped to hold a council to overthrow his mad father. Oswell had been working with his brother to support the desire of his prince. Aerys’ insistence on attending the tourney had thrown all those plans in disarray. 

Elia staggered up the steps, holding on to the walls, hoping, wishing, that she could somewhat push back what awaited her. As if whatever was about to happen wouldn’t happen if she didn’t make it up those steps. Even inside the tower, heat licked at her skin and coiled around her like a great big viper. Oberyn held her elbow.

“Elia?” 

“I’m fine.” She moved his hand from her arm. She could smell the coppery, rusty smell of blood from where she stood. She was familiar with it herself after two difficult births. She strained her ears to listen for the crying of a child but no sound returned. At least not one of a baby. Instead, Elia heard Lyanna Stark’s muffled weeping.  _ She’s lost the child.  _

“ I didn’t want Father to die or Brandon. I didn’t want any of this to happen. The prince said we could live together and that he would be good to me.” Elia climbed the last step. 

“Ned I just didn’t want to marry Robert, I didn’t want anyone to be hurt.I-” Lyanna Stark’s blood shot eyes met her own and whatever sentence the girl was going to say got stuck in her throat. She lay in a bed of her own blood, her clothes were sweat-soaked and stuck to her. 

Confused, she looked to her brother. He explained Elia was the one who brought him here. Elia pushed her brother forward to help the trembling girl. From where she stood, Elia could see the tremor with which she held onto her brother all while her own hands shook. 

With a whimper she asked Elia to forgive her and the little resentment Elia carried flew out of her body. The young girl, ten years younger than Elia herself, was clammy. Sweat trickled down her temple and her eyes were wide in fear. 

She feared both for herself and her child. “ “Rhaegar is dead. Robert will kill me, Ned and he’ll kill the baby too. Promise me you won’t let him Ned, please promise me.” She held onto her brother tightly as she sobbed against him. “ _ Please you have to stop him Ned, please. He will kill him. _ _.. _ _ I don’t want to die, Ned,” _ she hiccuped tearfully.  _ “Not really. I want to go home to Winterfell, Ned. I want to see Benjen and Old Nan and Hodor. I want to ride with Harwin and Jory. Ned, please, promise me you’ll take me back. Please, promise me. I want to go to the crypts and see Father and Brandon. Please, Ned.” _ Elia did not know these people but she thought of her brothers when she thought death came for her. She knew this feeling well and as the sound of Lyanna’s wailing and her suffering echoed and bounced off the walls of the room, Elia felt hot tears well up in her eyes. Those tears ran down her cheeks the moment Oberyn looked up at her, arms wet with Lyanna’s blood to say with his eyes what Elia knew to be true the moment she began climbing up the stairs. 

The girl’s fear for the child placed in her brother’s arms was one Elia felt herself. The child was a quiet babe, disquisitive judging by the way he stared up at his uncle.  _ “Ned, please, promise me you won’t let him take my baby. Please, protect him Ned. I beg of you. Ned, I’m your sister. You have to remember that. Robert Baratheon will kill him. Please, Ned.”  _ Elia could not look any further, her own sobs racked through her body. She silenced them by biting her fist before Oberyn came upon her to hold her until her whimpering was the only sound in the room before the northmen came up the stairs. Martyn Cassel collapsed to his knees upon seeing the girl he has seen since she was a child. Howland Reed stumbled in. Ethan Glover crouched down, squatting to the ground while Theo Wull, the man of the easy smiles and booming laugh stared blankly. It was then that Elia turned round to see Lyanna Stark’s empty stare into the air and her brother’s equally devoid look. The only things that told Elia that Ned Stark was still alive were the tears that flowed from his eyes and upon the hand that held his sister’s, the quiver in his bottom lip and the softness with which he held her Aegon’s brother. Elia knew the moment Rhaegar told her that he’d left her with Arthur, Os and Gerold that he’d married her. He need not have confirmed it but he did so nonetheless. He married her in the God’s Eye among the weirwoods of the children and the First Men just as he’d married Elia in the Great Sept of Baelor. That child was as Targaryen as Aegon was and every fear Elia had for her child she held for his brother. The baby in King’s Landing, the one whose name she did not know, paid the price for her son. She did not want anyone to have to pay the price for this baby, least of all not him. 

Howland Reed had moved to separate the joined hands of the siblings and Elia’s feet had carried her to Ned Stark’s side. Her hands had extended themselves out to the child and Elia’s arms had held the motherless child to the bosom of a childless mother; a mother who had one dead child and one lost in the wind. He looked up at her with his mother’s eyes, cooing innocently unaware of what had just occurred in this room. Elia felt her throat close up and her eyes continued to release their burdens. From the corner of her eye she noticed the moment Ned Stark came back to himself and looked for the child in his arms. He relaxed when he saw Elia. They shared a moment of understanding. She knew little of the pain he felt but knew so very rawly the helplessness that came with not being able to prevent death’s kiss falling upon one who you love. 

The baby cooed again and Elia sniffled. All the anger she held for Rhaegar made way for nothing but care for the child in her arms. The motherless, fatherless child. When he began to cry, the wet nurse said that it was time to feed him before retiring to a sheltered corner behind the door with him. The northmen were around their lord and their lady. Oberyn hovered around her as if he were her shadow and the Kingsguard stood by the steps near the door. Elia ordered them to follow her outside. 

“What did your prince order you?” she asked, beginning her inquisition the moment they were outside. 

“He ordered us to protect the prince and his mother,” said Ser Gerold. 

“He left you with a pregnant child, on the Prince’s Pass with a single wet nurse and a midwife, nowhere near a maester!” Elia felt breathless with anger. “What is your plan now?” 

“We raise an army for Egg and his brother. We find Viserys and Queen Rhaella and die upholding our vows.”

“An army,” she scoffed. “What army? The Tyrells dipped their banners along with all their bannermen the moment they saw Lord Stark, Tywin Lannister ordered the murder of my children. It was his men that attacked Maegor’s Holdfast. Who else do you count on? My brothers? Ten thousand Dornish men marched with my Uncle Lewyn. Too few returned. Dorne has never been conquered, sers, but we are not an invading army nor do we have the numbers to place Egg on the throne. At least not yet.” 

“You will let what they did go?” Oberyn raged. “I will not be sated until I have Tywin Lannister’s head along with Robert’s. If I have to make the black of their rush red with blood, I will.”

Oberyn’s body held rage and passion in the same way Aerys’ pots held wildfire. When they mixed, as they did now, he was a volatile force ready to explode as sure as wildfire did the moment a spark of fire touched it. 

“I do not ask you to let anything go, Oberyn. Nor do I ask you,” she said looking at the Kingsguard, “to betray your vows. Remind me of them.” 

“I swear on my honour and my allegiance to protect the King and his family. I will do my duties until death, and through that time, keep all secrets of the King safe from spread. I will not speak unless spoken to, and I will defend the King’s land or pay the price. I will wed no wife, father no children and hold no land. I will master the gate, pluck the bow, handle the blade and serve my realm: for now and forever.” 

“Aerys is dead. Good riddance,” she spat. “Rhaegar is dead. My son is somewhere, alive.” Or so she hoped. “Now, who is your king?” 

“Prince Aegon is our king now,” Ser Gerold confirmed. Even the name of her son threatened to make her knees buckle. 

“But we cannot leave his brother either,” Arthur said. “We are sworn to protect the royal family.” 

“Where were you when they killed my child?” she shouted, slapping his face with a force that stung her hand. She knew she was being unreasonable but what was reason to a mother who was unable to stop her child being killed? Arthur merely stood there as she hit and hit and hit his chest. Oberyn had pulled her back. The sound of her wailing had brought the northmen down with a dazed Ned Stark at their head. In his arms he held his sister’s child. 

“Hand us the prince,” Ser Oswell demanded. 

“No.” Ned Stark’s tone was as icy as the land from which he hailed and just as harsh. 

“We will not leave without the prince.” Arthur withdrew Dawn from its scabbard across his shoulder and before she knew it the sound of swords being drawn filled the desert air. Oberyn grabbed his spear from where Areo stood with the horses and the Norvoshi captain of her brother’s guard grabbed the axe he loved as one might a wife.  _ Who will Oberyn fight for,  _ she wondered. 

She threw herself in the middle of where their melee was about to start, holding out her arms as if that would make her big enough to tower over them all. Every one of them was taller than her including the crannogman. 

“Enough!” she shouted. “How much blood do you all want to spill before it is enough?” Her voice was harried with grief and exhaustion. “ _ Enough _ .” 

“My sister left her child with me. I made a promise to raise him and I will. Any man who wishes to make me a liar should step forward now.” Even as he said that his eyes were empty. 

“And now it begins,” said Ser Arthur, holding Dawn with both his hands. The pale blade as always came alight as it glinted against the midday sun. 

“No,” Ned said with sadness in his voice. “Now it ends.” Before they could come together in a rush of steel and shadow, Elia moved to block them both. 

“I said, enough! Who am I?” she caterwauled at Arthur. Ned Stark was to her back. Before he could answer she sped on. “I am your princess,  _ twice over, _ I would remind you  _ ser _ ! And I have said enough! I have held two dead children in my arms, I will not hold a third.” 

Arthur had the courtesy to look chided lowering his eyes from her but making no move to step away. 

“Lord Stark,” she said, turning to the northern lord. “Please excuse us. I would like to speak to the Kingsguard alone. I want no blood shed here today.” 

When they were alone, Elia walked toward a tree with bleached white branches that withered up and died a century ago in this barren land. Her five companions had walked after her. Areo was no doubt under instructions to ensure she remained unharmed and Oberyn had given himself that duty from the moment he was able to crawl. 

“You are sworn to protect your king and you swore to Rhaegar that you would protect his son. How do you intend to protect the child with these faces of yours that are known from Dorne to the Wall? With what coin will you protect him? That child has no better protector than his uncle.” 

“He fought for the usurper, princess.” 

“And he saved the wife of the man who ran away with his sister. He sought justice for the children of that man. The usurper will pay but not for taking that ugly throne. Your king was mad and he was callous but you were sworn to protect him. I was not. I too would have risen in rebellion against him had he called for my head but what rebellion could I raise when he held my children? Ned Stark is not your enemy and he most certainly is not the enemy of his nephew. Lyanna Stark entrusted her child to her brother. He will have no better protector than the Warden of the North.” 

“Princess, you said yourself that the Lannisters killed Rhae and-”

“The Lannisters did and the Baratheon approved it. Ned Stark did not. He left the city in a cold fury. I am the one who travelled with him as he lamented the fate of my Rhaenys and the baby.” Elia sighed tirely. “My Aegon is alive.”  _ He has to be.  _ “The three of you are sworn to protect your king. You will find your rightful king and you will do what you swore to do. That child will have no better protector but my son needs you now.  _ Your king... _ needs you.” 

They had protested and protested but in the end agreed. Reluctantly. 

Elia marched up the stairs, struggling for breath to tell the northerners of the new state of affairs. This lot were drowning in grief while the men in white wallowed in the contradiction between their duty to their king and their promise to their dead prince. Someone had to take action. 

“I will not hand him over,” Lord Stark whispered. “I promised Lya.” Lyanna Stark’s face was covered with a white cloth unblemished by her blood while dead flowers lay all around her. The wilted roses reminded Elia of the beautiful crown Rhaegar had placed on the girl’s lap when both were alive, and hale, and hopeful. That hope was dead now but their child was still alive, and hale, and Elia was hopeful for his future. A silver lining in the dark cloud that had loomed above  _ all  _ of their lives. 

Elia moved to crouch near Ned Stark, looking up at him. She put her hand over his and whispered, “You don’t have to, but we have to all agree on a story.” 

Ned Stark said that he would raise the boy as his bastard. Elia asked him to let her raise him.  _ I could raise him and Egg together,  _ she hoped. The Stark lord refused. 

“What will you name him,” she smiled sadly, tearfully. 

The Stark lord smiled at the babe. “Jon.” 

_ Jon Targaryen, son of Rhaegar.  _ “A strong name.”

She gathered them all and stood in front of them.  _ Unbowed, unbent, unbroken _ . “What happened here will never leave this room. The two of you,” she said to the midwife and the wet nurse, “will join my brother’s household.” That way Doran could keep an eye on them. “Arthur, Os and Gerold, I know you will not bend the knee to this king. So from this day to all who knew you, you are dead. We will bury you here today and I order you never to show your face in this land again.” Elia knew she had no such power over them but they had agreed to find Egg, and she would not have anyone else know that he was alive. Queen Rhaella had a garrison to protect her and a sea to hold back those who would attack her. Egg had no one. 

“This tower will be torn down,” Ned Stark finally said, “for your cairns and because I cannot stand to see it stand when my sister lost her life here.” He whispered the last part. 

Elia stood under the shadeless tree singing lullabies that she had once sang to Rhaenys and Aegon, to the little boy Lyanna Stark had birthed, all while the men tore down the tower of misery Rhaegar had once called one of joy. 

When they were done, Arthur smashed Dawn against Lord Stark’s chest as he handed it to him. “This belongs to my family,” he said. “I would not be separated from it unless I were dead. Take it to my sister. And never bother her again.” 

At the mention of Ashara, the grief that was etched on Ned Stark’s face doubled. Something told Elia his pain was not yet at an end. They were heading for Starfall. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I’ve taken a little longer to update this chapter (well compared to usual). I had to take some time to think about where I see this fic going. Believe it or not I spent days on end googling war strategy before I concluded I am not a strategist. I just like writing angst and pain (with happy endings) and human stories so that’s what I’ll focus on. There were two ways this story could end but since we started with a “what if” I wanted to keep asking “what if’s” at various stages during canon so here we are. I still might change my mind in the course of writing this but let’s see lol. I will kill people who live in canon and allow others to survive because #bias. There are two people I currently plan to kill but I’ve been debating whether I can handle that kind of pain myself so I might let them live. Anyway, this was just a get back into writing chapter. I hope to be back soon with something longer.


	5. Eddard

**Eddard - 283 AC**

The fifth loss Ned suffered in the last year was the heaviest of all. It had been two days since he lost Lyanna. He tore down Rhaegar’s Tower of Joy with his own bloodied hands as well as the hands of the man’s friends, foes and family. As they did so the jagged red mountains of Dorne loomed behind their backs - mud red and brooding. 

One by one they raised the cairns over empty graves. Oberyn Martell had said he would find bodies to fill them with a bone chilling confidence that on a normal day might have frozen Ned’s marrow or disgusted him or pulled any reaction out of him that wasn’t blind anger or grief. But ever since he held Lyanna as she took her last breaths, Ned had known nothing but numbness, anger and a grief that snuck up on him quietly and left him drowned in a desert. When he closed his eyes he saw Lyanna in her bed of blood, her faint smile as she asked to be taken home and the flowers. Always the flowers. _Winter roses do not belong in the deserts of Dorne. Like her roses Lyanna too had wilted here._

The Kingsguard had removed their distinctive armour and their white cloaks in favour of Dornish sandsilks. Their faces wound about with wet yellow scarves in the Dornish fashion were the last he saw of them at Kingsgrave as they left in the company of the Norvoshi Captain after the Sunspear guards were sent home. 

“The bigger the party, the more attention we draw to ourselves,” Oberyn Martell explained, “though I’m not sure there’s much hiding the five of you. That you are not of Dorne is clear on your faces. No one here grows beards that thick.” He looked at Ned and his companions up and down. 

Before he departed, Arthur Dayne had warned Ned again to stay away from Ashara as if he had another choice. He was a married man and a father now. His love for Ashara was buried in his heart, the only place it would ever burn bright. No one else would ever know of it. Including her. It would tear him apart but Lady Catelyn deserved better from him. He swore vows and Ned would not break them. 

He laughed bitterly when he realised that to his wife and to everyone else he would be an oath breaker who had lain with a woman while married. Jon was the proof of that. Ned had learnt honour from his father and had lived it under Jon Arryn. To all now his honour would be just as soiled as that of every bastard’s father. And yet for Lyanna, the sister he had so badly failed, there was little he would not do, even if he broke the heart of his wife in the process. The baby asleep in his arms deserved to live. Ned would ensure he did. He just hoped Lady Catelyn would find it in her heart to forgive him. 

The princess had offered to take in the child Ned had named after Jon Arryn. From the way she sang to him, and laughed with him and talked to him, he knew she held no malice against him but Ned could not bear to be separated from his last link to Lyanna. He’d lost so much of his family that he made a silent, unspoken, vow to himself, to always keep them by his side. The boy would not be any different. From this day on, he was his son. He would raise him so until he was a man grown...or until Robert died for he would not be safe until the man Ned chose as a brother had died. _It might never be safe for him._

The boy was Stark in look but Ned knew from the three greatest swords left to oversee him that he was a trueborn prince of the blood. They called him as much. Ned remembered how Brandon nearly choked in rage when Rhaegar had crowned Lyanna. “He means to dishonour her,” his brother gibed. “She is betrothed and soon to be wedded. My sister is not a whore!”

Robert had laughed it off but Ned knew he brooded in his offence. 

The Silver Prince had wedded Lyanna and protected her honour, though he had dishonoured his wife. 

The boy was not a bastard but a prince and yet for his safety he would live in the shadows of Ned’s children, tainted by the name Snow for it was safer than the name Targaryen. He hoped the child would not resent him for it one day. 

At Skyreach, Lord Franklyn Fowler had offered to have Lyanna’s bones prepared for travel by the Silent Sisters but Ned had no desire to tarry there. They would have to wait at least a week for the sisters to arrive. That would only mean it would take longer for them to reach Starfall. Ned wanted nothing more than to return the sword of House Dayne and return home. 

In the end, to preserve Lyanna’s body, Oberyn suggested keeping her in a cask of rum before he sent a raven to Starfall warning Lord Dayne of their impending arrival. The thought of seeing Ashara again filled him with equal amounts of dread and desire. It had been so long since he found comfort in her arms and he was so desperate for comfort and love but as a mirage in a desert and the stars in the sky, that too was unattainable for Ned. Ashara fell outside his reach the day he stood in the sept with his wife. The only comfort he’d ever have in his life would be from Lady Catelyn, though he didn’t think she would give him any comfort when he presented her with a child he’d say he got on another woman. 

As they began their march up the western side of the Red Mountains, Ned’s eyes kept finding the cask in which his sister slept.

The burning sun of Dorne blazed and burnt them during the day. Sand storms whipped around them on an almost daily basis. They’d come without warning in gusts of wind and grit and rage red against their skin. The scarves around their heads served as silk veils to keep the sand out of their eyes and their mouths. Even the baby had one. Princess Elia held him against her chest when he was not with his wet nurse. One who didn’t know them would think he was a child of her body. Ned knew that he was a surrogate for her own. The prince she’d lost. When they rose against Aerys, none had known who would sit upon the throne. Ned had considered Rhaegar if he returned Lyanna. When he died, Ned had considered a regent for the prince but he too followed his father. The realm was left with Prince Viserys now but Ned knew the boy would never sit upon his ancestors’ throne in that cavernous room. Not after what transpired in Maegor’s Holdfast. Robert was next in line after him and Ned thought that by now he’d be crowned. 

Ned’s skin had blistered and peeled in more than one place as had those of his companions; none as bad as Buckets of the mountains. These mountains were so different from their own and those of the Vale as well. Here as there, the tips of the mountains jutted upwards as arrows aimed at the sky. However, where snow powdered the Mountains of the Moon and blanketed those of the North, here the mountains were bleak and bare and red with the dust from which they got their name. 

In his _Conquest of Dorne,_ the boy king, King Daeron I, had written of how of the sun and spear of the Martells, the sun was the more deadly weapon. Ned had learned to rue that lesson as well. Sadly, he thought, _I do not belong here, Ashara. I am a man of snow and ice and I will only melt into nothingness here. Just as we have._

Skyreach was surrounded by valleys full of game that meant they did not want for food in their journey. Thankfully, the nights grew cold on the sands during which his four companions, the baby, his wet nurse, the midwife and the prince and princess found respite from the arid air of the day. Princess Elia was struggling. He knew from how often she dozed in her saddle and how she winced as she limped that she was unwell. She was a small woman, thin and frail and every passing day made him more appreciative of the boon she had given him in taking him to his sister and doting upon the child her husband had with another woman. Every time he tried to express his gratitude to Princess Elia, his words failed him. Most women would not find that kindness in their hearts. He hoped Lady Catelyn was in the smaller group. 

This night, they sat around a fire passing around summerwine. Across from him, Ethan Glover stole shy glances of the princess but looked away they moment he saw Ned. Elia Martell carried her grief with a grace that Ned had not yet mustered. He spent his days staring into nothingness all the while the rest of his companions took turns seeing to the babe. He had no doubt she carried mountains of grief in her heart but she had a quick wit and a kindness that won over all his men. 

With the ever present Red Mountains at his back, Theo Wull sang _Wolves in the Hills_ about the Starks and their mountain clans. As he did so Oberyn Martell pounced at once and flipped open a vial he dug out from inside his silks. In the firelight Ned saw him hold a viper in his hand. He held the snake with one hand and asked Princess Elia to place a silk scarf over the top of the vial. Entranced, Ned watched the man they called the Red Viper hold the snake’s head, causing it to bite the glass. He smirked across the fires at Ned while massaging the head of the snake as it spat out a yellow liquid.

“Your hills have wolves and ours vipers,” he said nonchalantly. “You never know when you’ll need this venom in Dorne. I know not when I must kill a man. Though I should say the right venom can cure as well as it can kill.”

Of all the people who knew of Jon’s parentage, none was more volatile than the man Ned faced. He did not trust the man one bit. Yet he had taken him to his sister so Ned had to begrudgingly accept his company. Oberyn Martell had the eyes of a snake, moved as quick as one and was just as poisonous judging from his reputation. The man was baying for war. _Another one might start before we have a moment to rest._ Ned wanted no part in it. Were the Martells to rebel...he had not yet bent the knee to the man who was his brother. He would not stand against him either. Ned Stark was a man of the North and he wanted nothing more than to stay there, shore up the defences of Moat Cailin and White Harbor and never leave his lands again. 

Howland had offered to raise the child in Greywater Watch. “None will find my castle, Ned,” he stressed, “they will not do to Jon what they did to his siblings.” _His siblings._ The bloodied bodies of Rhaegar’s children had seldom left his mind. While there was merit in Howland’s suggestion, and Buckets’ who pointed out that none but a northerner knew to find the lands of the Wulls who neighboured the Norreys along the Bay of Ice. _I promised Lyanna._ He would raise her child in their home. A son of Winterfell with Stark blood running through his veins. 

After three more days, their path began to become lined with gnarled, thorny trees. He heard the princess tell Martyn that the trees were called sandbeggars and that the thicket around them suggested they were near water. The further west they went the more hawks and birds Ned saw and heard. Before long, he saw the turquoise-blue waters of the Torentine as they babbled and burbled over red rocks that glittered like rubies under the rush of the fast river. The hedgerows were thick with prickly pears and here and there he saw date palms. The river snaked its way through rapids and canyons, crevasses and waterfalls, one of which had reminded Ned of the beauty still left in the world. It was a shade of darker blue and nothing short of enchanting. He wondered whether Ashara had come here before...if this was somewhere they’d have gone were war not to come. The waters fell in waves over the rocks joyfully, cascading down into the pool in snow white and settling into the other-worldly blue hues of the Torentine. Ned could see down into the rocky bottom of the river. After all the red of the mountains the forest-green plants that waved gently in the waters’ depths reminded him that hope could be found in the desert. He’d found it himself when his sister left her babe within his arms. No one could ever replace Lyanna or all he lost but Ned was grateful for the boy he’d raise as Jon Snow. 

Ned saw Oberyn Martell strip down and stand under one of the smaller waterfalls to cool down. Before long they all joined in, laughing and enjoying the coolness. All but the princess who held Jon and laughed with him as she paddled her feet in the waters. The two of them were having a conversation none other was privy to. The view made him smile and before long his smile caved as he thought of another Dornishwoman in another world holding his child on the banks of the river that flowed outside her home. 

Before sunset he saw banners blowing with the dark star of House Dayne of High Hermitage. The castle stood bold on the red and greener beyond. Nestled between the mountains, High Hermitage stood proud. For a small castle it was lofty and well fortified amidst more greenery than Ned had seen for days. As they made their way into the castle welcomed by Ser Benedict Dayne of High Hermitage Ned admired the build. The castle had double belt walls, a bailey and battlements reinforced by five fortified towers. Inside was a well and a cistern fed by rainwater. Ned thought that it was unlikely that would get filled up often. 

Ashara was only a day away at most. As he lay in the cell assigned to him, Ned thought of her as he last saw her. Tall and fair with laughing violet eyes. Her long black hair blew in the wind as she smiled at him from the deck of the galley. She waved at him full of hope. “We will meet again, my lady,” he told her. And now they would. 

All night he twisted and turned trying to soothe the triplets of dread and desire and debasement for damn him he wanted nothing more than to have her once more. He could not and he knew she would not let him. Ashara had not even told him about the pregnancy. Ashara who couldn’t stay quiet for more than a few moments at a time. _Beautiful Ashara. My Ashara bled out my child and I was nowhere near her._

Every thought of her brought with it longing and lament and guilt. He should be thinking of his wife. She was a courteous girl who always knew what to say. Lord Hoster had said she’d been the acting Lady of Riverrun since her mother’s demise. She was well-loved by those in their castle he saw and from the few days he’d spent with her he knew she knew how to run their castle well. The Lord Paramount’s daughter was a worthy bride for the heir to Winterfell. Ned as a second son would never have had prospects that high and with Ashara he had never wanted to reach those heights. With his laughing Dornishwoman he was happy. 

A day of travel later, he sat upon a stand steed outside Starfall with his heart in his mouth and a twisting in his gut of fear and failure. 

“I can take Dawn back for you if you wish,” the princess offered before they left High Hermitage. “When we are leaving Starfall, I can send you a raven.” 

He had thought for a while about the offer. He thought about the heart ache he’d avoid but he had to be the one to return the sword. He had to see her one last time.

The purple banners of House Dayne adorned the walls of the castle that stood on an island where the Torentine joined the Summer Sea. The castle and its Palestone Tower were said to be the location where a Dayne once chased a falling star from whose heart he had forged _Dawn,_ the sword Ned carried upon his back. Ned saw Ashara hurtle upon the battlements grabbing the wall and staring at him and the sword that peeked over his shoulder. An involuntary whimper escaped her lips and a look of betrayal adorned her face. She knew what this meant and he hated that he’d have to lie to her and to everyone else from this day forward. Ned lowered his eyes, drowning in a pit of unease. Ashara only stood at the walls, tilting her head to look at him as their party entered their castle. Tears creeped out of her eyes.

They were welcomed to the castle by Lady Dayne who said that Lord Dayne was out visiting Sunspear. “Dorne will rise against the usurper,” she said staring Ned down. Ashara came running toward him with contempt and anger upon her face. She slapped him hard. “How could you do that to my brother?” she screamed. “How could you kill him? Take it off. Take it off now, Ned! Take off my brother’s sword!” she cried against his chest, hitting him with every word that left her lips.

Ned looked away from her, red-faced and trying his hardest not to cry for the grief that he had visited upon her. She grabbed the sword from his hand and hugged it against her chest and walked away without greeting neither her prince or princess. 

He felt sick and rooted to the spot. Somewhere in the distance he heard the squaling of a bird, the sun beat down upon him, and all around him the guards of House Dayne looked at him with both gratitude and grief. He had returned their sword but they had lost its master. 

Princess Elia whispered, “Please give her time.” Somehow Ned did not believe that to be enough. 

“Princess Elia,” Lady Dayne continued, “I am so grateful to see you home. We will never forget what was done to you and to Dorne. I will pray everyday for the fall of the usurper and all those who followed him.” 

“I thank you Lady Dayne,” Princess Elia said in her kind voice. Then raising her voice for all in the courtyard to hear, she added, “It is thanks to Lord Stark and his men that I am here today. These men are not enemies of Dorne but friends. I ask you to treat them as such despite the unfortunate events that have come upon us. Lady Dayne,” she stated more quietly, “We are also very weary. We have come a long way. Perhaps we might retire to our chambers. We will also need the service of the Silent Sisters.” 

As they were guided by the steward to sleeping quarters and baths, for Starfall was surrounded by water, Ned could not remove from his mind the image of how Ashara’s face tightened with betrayal when she walked away from him. He still felt adrift as if the ground had fallen away and he were nothing more than a stringless kite. He had lost her for good. He knew he had the day he met Lady Catelyn but now he saw it for the surety it was. 

He had the child brought to his rooms that night and slept with him by his side. He hoped that if there was one person in this world that might love him, it might be the child. His son might despise him for how he treated his mother. He thought Lady Catelyn would find him a most unsuitable husband for bringing her a bastard. Darkly, he thought of Brandon who would have spread his seed far and wide. _I will only ever have the one. I swore a vow._

The baby boy’s grey eyes were discerning. Less than a month old, he had sharp eyes and a coo that Ned would die for. He wondered if his own son sounded like this too. He wished the two would have nothing but love between them. 

For the duration of their stay, like the coward he was, Ned Stark remained in his sleeping quarters, leaving only to take supper with his men and walk along the island with Princess Elia who would invite him out now and again. He had not seen Ashara once since the first day he arrived. 

Though that was not to say that she did not know of everything that went on in her home. When the Silent Sisters had arrived and prepared Lyanna’s bones for travel, Ned had looked upon them. All that was left of Lyanna, so full of life, were her bones laid out in the box that would return her home. Her hands were clasped together over her chest. She’d been dressed in a white silk gown with purple skirts. Ned remembered then where he’d last seen the dress. It was the one Ashara had worn at Harrenhal.

“She liked flowers,” he heard someone say. “We do not have the roses you said she liked here. These are all we have.” Ashara stood at the door of the room, teary-eyed and with a bunch of pink desert roses in her hands. 

He knew not what to say to her or which grief to give voice to. “Thank you, my lady.” 

“I’m sorry for Lady Lyanna, and Brandon and your father,” she said finally, standing next to him, still too far from him to reach. _Like the stars that reminded me of her._ She wore a silk gown that hid little of the curves and crevices of her body. The slits of the skirt were what showed him the leather sandals she wore that wrapped their way all the way to her thighs. She lifted Lyanna’s hands to place the flowers upon her chest before returning her hands to her position.

“I’m sorry for Arthur.”

She nodded. “She was a beautiful girl. I’m sorry you had to lose her.” 

Ned gulped, fearing that any words he said would only expound his anguish. Ashara searched his face with her big violet eyes that he so often lost himself in.

“You have a natural son.”

“I do, my lady.” 

“Who was his mother?” 

“You wouldn’t know her.”

Ashara laughed then, his favourite sound in the world. He couldn’t help but smile.

“I seem to recall how shy you were with me, Ned and how you immediately requested that we go to a sept to marry so that no child from our union would be a bastard.”

_Would that we had._

“Do you remember what I said to you?”

“That bastards were born of passion.” 

“Still, you insisted that you speak to your father as soon as you could for you _regretted dishonouring_ me. Am I to believe one year made you so different that you would step outside the bounds of your marriage?” 

“My lady I-” 

“You did not write to me even once, Ned. And as much as I believe that you will grow to love your wife, I know it was not because of love for her. You would not dishonour her. That baby might look like you but he is not of your seed.” 

“My lady-”

She raised a hand. “You might convince someone else of your lies but you always shuffle your feet when you are uncomfortable just as you are now.” 

He looked down at his feet then, caught and ensnared. 

She smiled at him. “He is Rhaegar and Lyanna’s and I know why you must lie to the world. Everyone has heard what they did to Elia’s children.” He raised his head to look at her, sure that someone had already revealed Jon’s parentage but Ashara had a way of reading him. “Oberyn talks a lot but he would not risk a child and your northmen are as prickly as they come when someone asks about the child. They’d sooner die than let a word escape their lips. I know because I know you. Ned,” she breathed, moving even closer to him. “Once you go out there into the world they will ask you who his mother was. If you struggle as you do now, well… you won’t convince anyone will you?” 

He rubbed the back of his neck feeling a fool. 

“Leave him here with me. Let me raise him as mine.”

“I can’t, Ashara, I-”

“Finally,” she exclaimed, “he remembers I have a name.” 

“Ashara, I will not have your name dragged through the mud.” 

“I am Dornish dear, natural children are not as derided here as they are beyond our mountains. I will love him, in place of the child we might have had. Oberyn apologised profusely. Ever since we were children, he has had a protectiveness over me second only to Arthur’s as unusual as it may seem for the man who has natural daughters of his own. Leave Jon here with me, Ned. He will want for nothing and I will allow no harm to come to Rhaegar’s child. He was my friend and a brother to mine.” 

“I promised my sister. I will raise him myself. _I have to._ ” His lip quivered. 

She moved ever closer taking his hand in hers. _Where it should belong,_ he thought, _but where it will never. Not now_. “I would be honoured to be his mother.” 

At that, he swiped his eyes but the tears came anyway. “Ashara, I’m so sorry I didn’t know about the child. I swear if I did-”

“What?” she smiled, still holding his hand. “You were married. Starfall is ancient and Dayne is an old name but marrying me would give you no armies and in any case, my people fought against you. Marrying me would have made no difference...not that you could.” 

“I should have been there with you,” he whispered when she left. He said that both to the woman he lost and the sister whose bones he stood over. 

He did not see Ashara again for a whole day. On his last night at Starfall he lay with the baby on his bed. The balcony doors were wide open letting in the cool nightly breeze. He heard the burbling of the Torentine outside. The sound of the waves soothed the baby to sleep. He ran his fingers down Jon’s cheeks eliciting a toothless smile from the sleeping baby. Ned was mirroring him when he heard a quiet knocking at his door. 

“You haven’t eaten,” Ashara said, shoving a tray full of food against his chest when he opened the door. 

“It would seem Daynes have a habit of pushing things against my chest,” he joked, forgetting that she believed her brother to be dead. “My lady, I-”  
“Shut it, Ned. I’m here to see the child and to ensure you eat.” She walked into the room without seeking permission and sat on the bed, holding Jon against her chest and kissing his brow. “Keep the door open. I know you are fretting about being in a room alone with a woman.” 

“How did you know I haven’t eaten,” he teased, teetering on inappropriate. “Have you been watching me?” 

“I have little else to do, my lord, than watch the eating habits of the man who killed my brother.” 

“Ashara, I’m so-” 

“I know.” 

He’d been tongue-tied since the moment he first met her. Brandon had been the one to ask her to dance with him at Harrenhal. So intimidated was he by her presence. And never was he more dumbfounded by her beauty than now as she sat on his bed in her Dornish silks with a baby on her lap. She was showing him what he would never have. Behind her, in the night sky, he saw the red wanderer within the moonmaid but no star in the sky burnt as bright as the sword of the morning and no woman could ever compare to Ashara. 

As he ate the bowl of olives, cheese and chickpea paste with flatbread, he stole glances at her, at the dip in her waist, at the tanned skin of her shoulder where a star held together her silks. He looked at her full lips, and the eyes he loved so much. Loving and lamenting his loss. 

Now and again as he ate, he’d catch her looking at him with the same longing. He kept reminding himself of a beautiful lady in Riverrun with thick auburn hair and piercing blue eyes but his mind’s eye would replace her every time with the purple-eyed maid with the black hair that fell in ringlets to her back and felt like silk between his fingers. 

He drank the cup of the sweet strongwine she provided him with, hoping for a distraction. The sound of her singing to the child soothed and disturbed him in equal measure for he remembered her singing to him as they lay in bed the first and only time he had her. On that night, they planned the future that was as out of bounds as the sword of the morning was to all the wanderers in the night sky. 

She smiled when she caught him staring but he noticed the tears in her eyes. For a time they lost themselves in each other’s eyes, neither saying a word. Fearful that they would break the trance. Ned Stark had never loved a woman before her, and he wasn’t sure he could love anyone knowing she was alive, even if out of reach. 

“We should have married in Gulltown,” she said in a voice so small he almost didn’t hear her.

At once sorrow surged through him. 

“I would have given you sons and loved this one. I would have loved you, Ned. Until the day I died.”

There was no moment he chose to move but he did, to sit next to her pulling her against his chest. Ned did not know what to say. _I wish we did,_ he wanted to say. _I wish I had sons with you. I would have loved you until the day I died._ But he could not. Not when a lady awaited him at Riverrun. So he held her tight as they both cried with his nephew between them. He kissed her hair and held her and breathed in her scent.

“Tell me about her,” she said. “About your wife.”

“I don’t really know her, my lady-”

“Call me by my name, Ned. Please,” she said in her small voice. Her head was on his shoulder.

“Lady Catelyn, is a kind woman,” he began, “and courteous.”

“And beautiful. I saw her at court once but she was much younger then and even then Lord Hoster Tully’s daughter was striking. You will be happy with her. She has good hips too. She will give you many children. Not like me.”

“Ashara, don’t,” he rasped, his grief returning in a torrent of tears. 

“I couldn’t even carry my child to full term. I couldn’t even do that,” she sobbed.

“I love you,” he blurted, “child or none. You are the brightest star in my night sky.” 

She looked up to face him, placing a hand upon his cheek and raising her eyes to his. “I love you,” he repeated. Moving towards her face. She closed her eyes and parted her lips but before he placed his lips on hers, he remembered Lady Catelyn. _My wife._ So he placed his forehead against Ashara’s. He would not break his vows. Not even for the woman he loved.

“Do you think they’ll keep his parentage secret?” Ashara asked him, not moving away and not opening her eyes. He did not want to move either. This would be the closest he’d ever be to her again. He breathed in her scent once more as her lashes brushed against his.

“They swore vows and they saw what happened to Rhaegar’s children. They wouldn’t let that happen to Lyanna’s. Ethan loved my brother as his own, Howland cared for Lyanna, Martyn raised her and Theo Wull is too faithful to betray a vow. He lives up in the mountains far from gossip.” 

“If they ever ask, you should say I’m his mother.” 

“I will never let them speak bad of you.”  
“I will never enter Robert’s court. I don’t care what they say.” Her lips were a hair breadth apart from his and damn him for a moment he thought he wouldn’t stop her if she chose to kiss him. The moment her soft lips touched his, Jon cooed and Ashara moved away from him. The moment had passed. 

She cleared her throat. “I should go.”

“Please stay,” he whispered.

“And do what?” she teased. 

“Talk to me. This will be the last chance we’ll ever have.”

“I know, but your wife awaits you in Riverrun and I do not want to speak about the regrets of the past. There is little we can do to change them.” Ever so softly she kissed his brow. Before she could get up he held on to her waist. “Please,” he breathed. “Ashara.” 

Her lips brushed the corner of his, delicately, just long enough for her breath to mingle with his before she moved away. She kissed Jon’s brow next, laid him on the bed and walked away. 

He worried, for a moment, that he had ruined his last chance with her but then at the door, she turned round to him. Tearfully, she said “I love you too.”

His heart broke once more. Now he lost Ashara for good. His lips tingled with the ghost of her kiss long after she left.

The next morning they boarded a galley to Sunspear. This time he was the one aboard the deck of a ship and Ashara was the one waving him off. Where last time they exchanged smiles, this time she cried and he looked up at the heavens willing himself not to join her for his men were here. Princess Elia took his hand and waved at the woman who was her friend. “She will always love you as you do her,” she said to him. “Even if you will never meet again.”

He knew he would never write to her again, or read her cursive script or see her or love her anywhere but in his heart. He knew it yet it did not make the pain any easier. 

That morning she insisted he take a wet nurse from her home with him. Wylla she was called. “My mother insists on suckling my sister, Allyria herself. Elia said she’d find you a wet nurse but Wylla is here. Pay her well!” Her wink and smile made him smile leagues away on the Summer Sea. He blinked back his tears. 

Days later they arrived at Sunspear, the closest thing to a city Ned had seen in all his time in Dorne. 

Princess Elia changed into orange silks held together by a copper sun. Her hair fell behind her back a midnight black. Upon her head was a band of copper suns. _The Sun of Dorne had returned._

They were met by a Dornish guard, tens of whom carried banners flailing about in the arid air with the sun and spear of House Martell. Upon the most glorious sand steed Ned had ever seen sat the ruling prince of Dorne, Prince Doran Martell. Seeing his sister, he dismounted and carried her off her feet. The gathered crowds cheered upon the return of their princess. 

“Lord Stark,” he said, moving to Ned. “You have my gratitude for the good you did for my sister. Request whatever you like of me and it is yours.” 

“Well met, Prince Doran,” Ned replied, “For now some shade and water are all we need.”

“Please,” he gestured, “follow me.” 

In the distance, the ancient castle of House Martell stood upon a hill of stone and sand surrounded on three sides by the sea. The Spear Tower stood a hundred-and-a-half-feet tall ,crowned with a spear of gilded steel that added another thirty feet to its height. On the opposite end stood the Tower of the Sun, with a dome of gold and leaded glass; last was the dun-colored Sandship, a tribute to Queen Nymeria. 

To the west, in the shadows of Sunspear’s walls, were mud-brick shops and windowless hovels that clung to the castle. Stables and inns and winesinks and pillow houses lay to their west, many enclosed by walls of their own.

They were guided through narrow alleys, hidden courts and noisy bazaars in each of which crowds gathered to welcome their princess while calling for death to fall upon the usurpers. “Justice for Princess Rhaenys and Prince Aegon and Prince Lewyn of Dorne,” they shouted. “Vengeance!” 

“The usurpers must fall.” 

Someone had thrown rotten fruit at Ned and another had hit Martyn Cassell. The guards raised their shields and spears, blocking the crowd from getting any nearer. 

Princess Elia’s voice rose above all of them. “The men who you are deriding are my dearest friends and the men who saved my life!” she exclaimed. “I thank you for your concern for me and for my children. I loved them more than you can know. There are oppressors holding up Robert Baratheon’s reign,” she added. “It is true but these men are not from them. Please, show some respect.” And with those words alone, the crowd had quieted, and then dispersed. Ned admired the strength in her voice. _She was once a future queen._

Elia shot him a kind smile and rode beside her brothers. 

The throne room at Sunspear had two thrones, one of the sun and one of a spear. A fair woman introduced as the Lady Mellario of Norvos, greeted them inside. In her arms was a baby and holding on to her skirts a small girl wearing a crowned sun. She was Princess Arianne Nymeros Martell, heir to Sunspear. 

Prince Oberyn Martell himself was crowded by three girls all of whom laughed and raced towards him. They were the natural daughters Princess Elia had told him about. All of the children ran to their aunt. For a moment he saw Princess Elia blink back her tears, no doubt reminded of the daughter she lost.

After supper, Ned sat with the ruling prince and his siblings. The two men were as different as the sun and moon. Where one was calm, the other was fiery. Where one considered his words, the other seldom held anything back. He could see them studying him too. Oberyn Martell peeled a blood orange, smirking at him in a way Ned couldn’t say was threatening but it was discomforting.

“You believe Robert belongs on the throne,” Prince Doran began.

“He is the heir.” 

“Some would say the last living Targaryen prince is...Prince Viserys. Queen Rhaella is also pregnant, there may be one more Targaryen left in the world...or more.” 

“If one of them was to claim that jutted throne, where do you stand?” Oberyn Martell finished for his brother before sucking on his blood orange. The red juices trickled down his fingers. 

“I fought because the king had requested my head for no crime of mine. He had both my father and brother killed. I do not care for who sits on that throne but Robert by now will be crowned king.” 

“Instead of your nephew,” Prince Oberyn said, licking his fingers. “Doran knew they held your sister there long before you did, my lord. I did not break my promise to you.” 

“I do not believe that is something my sister wanted for him. I have just finished fighting a war. I have no intention to fight another.” 

“But you agree...a son of Rhaegar belonged on that throne.”

“They killed Prince Aegon and my son’s name is Jon Snow, the son of Wylla, a Dornish wet nurse. No son of Rhaegar is alive to challenge for that throne, Prince Oberyn.” 

The conversation replayed in his mind long into the night and until the next morning. The Dornish were intent on crowning a king. Prince Viserys would be their king. 

“Princess Elia,” he called out, walking toward her. 

“My lord.” 

“I do not want to have to lie to everyone I know Princess,” he sighed, “I know Ser Arthur, Ser Oswell and Ser Gerold will go to Dragonstone and I do not want to be proved a liar. I have already lied to Ashara and broken her heart.” 

The princess smiled and with a surety said, “They will not go to Dragonstone.” 

Ned furrowed his brow in confusion. "They are sworn to protect the royal family." 

"They also made a vow to protect Rhaegar's son. They will protect Jon by staying away. Arthur made Ashara believe he was dead. Not just you." 

"You will crown Viserys."

"I swear to you, my lord, I will not. I have no intention to put Viserys on the throne or to risk Jon's life. After all that has happened, I want to be as far away as possible from the cesspool that is King's Landing." 

While he was unsure of Princess Elia, Ned knew her brothers were baying for blood - Lannister blood and perhaps Robert’s too. Ned wanted nothing more than to return home to Winterfell. First he’d settle Jon home and move south to take his lady and child home. And then, he prayed, he would never come south again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing sad boy Ned makes me sad. 
> 
> I ship Ashara/Ned but the next time we see him (after one or two short time jumps) will be 17 years from now so let’s hope he’s a happier man by then.
> 
> Oberyn is just menacing in the background as usual. He did indeed milk the local vipers and like any cool uncle/father took the sand snakes and Arianne with him. 
> 
> Believe it or not I’ve been googling how to prevent the onset of gout and I’ve prescribed Doran a lay-off-the-wine order lmao but he doesn’t get seriously ill in canon until around 16 years from now. Still, you know what they say prevention is better than cure. Half maester Oberyn needs to keep checking his brother’s health too lmao. 
> 
> Next up another Ned chapter when he takes his bride home to his bastard.


	6. Eddard

**Eddard - 283 AC**

“They wouldn’t be dead if it wasn’t for me.” 

“You or me?” 

They were once a family of six. They were Lord Rickard and his lady wife Lady Lyarra Stark and their children: Brandon, the eldest, _the Wild Wolf_ , Ned, _the Quiet Wolf_ \- particularly next to his siblings _\- Lyanna,_ their only she-wolf, and Benjen, _the pup. Even now nearly a man grown he’s still a pup._

Once, their father taught them the meaning of honour and the Stark traditions. Rickard Stark had a long stern face like so many Starks before him. He was strict but had a way with people that made him beloved to his family and people alike. Their mother too was a Stark by birth. When Ned was little she showered him with her love and her knowledge of their heritage. Her mother, Arya Flint, was of the mountain clans and she embedded a deep love of the mountain clans in all her children. It was through her that a young Ned once met Theo Wull. 

Once upon a time Brandon had taught Ned how to fight with sticks and Lyanna had done the same for Ben. Brandon was born to rule. He had an easy smile and an easy way with people. The ladies loved him and had father not hated it, Ned was sure Brandon would fill the North with his bastards. Father used to say that he had the _wolf blood,_ a wildness found in particular Starks of every generation. His mother used to say he got it from her father, Rodrik Stark, _The Wandering Wolf_ who once travelled to Essos to join a sellsword company. Ned imagined that were his brother not heir he too would have done the same. _Wherever he went he would be loved._

Then there was Lyanna...Ned had no words to describe his sister. She was a beautiful girl, kind and gentle with a wild streak that made her as like to hit you as she was to hug you. Their mother had died when they were all small, Ben and Lyanna especially. From a young age she had been the Lady of Winterfell and with her brothers fostered elsewhere from the age of ten, she effectively acted as her father’s heir at home. She was the apple of all their eyes. _And I failed her. She died because of me not you, Ben._

And Ben...Benjen idolised his older siblings. Brandon was his hero but he also looked up to Ned in a way that made him feel special. Next to his older brother Ned often felt unseen and unremarkable but to Benjen they were otherworldly. Ben was especially close to Lyanna. They often mocked each other but made up straight after. At Harrenhal, Rhaegar played a sad song that made Lyanna cry on his harp. Ben had mocked her for it and in front of everyone she poured wine over his head. The memory made Ned laugh on this sombre occasion. Even still, despite their silly quarrel, that very same night Lyanna and Ben made up and he helped her find armour to dress up as a mystery knight to avenge Howland Reed’s honour. _Our father’s man,_ Ben said she called him. Despite being the youngest, Ben was the secret keeper of all of them. He saw Ned sneak away during the nights of the tourney with Ashara and said nought to no one. He knew of every lady Brandon had a dalliance with but would never say anything and he knew of Lyanna and Rhaegar but did not betray her secret until all went awry. 

Of that family of six, now only two remained. Ned stood in the crypts with Benjen surrounded by the tombs of their parents and siblings. The stonemason had begun work on Father’s tomb while Ned was still in the south. He had known him well. The statue looked like him. Their father sat like he might have when he was still alive. He sat with the quiet dignity that was quintessential of him. His sword sat across his lap as it did across the lap of every other Lord of Winterfell buried here and every King of Winter before him. He had only ever seen his father sit with a sword across his lap once when a wildling had been caught “stealing a woman” in a local village. “A lord must never sit with unsheathed steel in front of a guest, Brandon,” he told Ned’s brother, “Only unsheath your sword when you mean to use it.” The lesson had been for his brother but Ned had learned it nonetheless. 

Brandon had no statue nor did Lyanna or their mother. The custom was for only the Lords of Winterfell and their kings to have them. That made him sad. _Brandon would have been the lord after father._

Beyond where they stood, the crypt continued on into darkness ahead of them. There black holes lay empty and unsealed waiting for their dead: he and Benjen and whatever children they may have. One day they’d join their family here. 

“If I didn’t help her wear the armour she would have never met the prince… if I told Father she planned to meet the prince before Brandon’s wedding, he could have stopped her,” Benjen said, tearfully placing a hand on Lyanna’s sealed tomb. They had buried her today. After the false spring in the year the Tourney of Harrenhal was held, winter returned to Westeros and the farmers and mountain clans returned to Winter Town. The town that came alive every winter watched silently and soberly as Lyanna Stark, their she-wolf, was brought home one last time. She had been the one they came to while Ned and Brandon were away from home. She had been the friend of the smallfolk and their Lord’s little lady. The household staff wept when she came back in death. All but Old Nan who shed no tears. With a strength in her old voice she simply stroked the cloth upon Lyanna’s skull and said, “They have taken a third child of mine.”

Ned and Ben had collected winter roses from the glass gardens to lay beside her crypt. They were her favourite. _And they made up the crown with which Rhaegar had crowned her. The moment that all smiles at Harrenhal died._ She had died surrounded by them. 

“If Brandon knew he wouldn’t have gone marching to King’s Landing,” Benjen continued, swiping the tears angrily from his face. “All three of them are dead and it’s all my fault.” 

“It’s my fault brother,” Ned corrected him. “I should have listened to her wishes. We all should have-”

“She felt cornered. You know how she was, Ned. Then the prince told her he cared for her. That he could have two wives. He said that Princess Elia was a kindly woman-” 

_She is._  
“He said that he had a duty to House Targaryen to produce more heirs and that he could give Lyanna a family and safety and he was the only person who could stop Robert from marrying her. She said he didn’t care that she was wild and that he loved her because of it. Ned,” he sobbed, “I swear I would have said something if I knew what was going to happen. Lyanna said she was going to leave Father a letter in Riverrun. He must have not gotten a chance to read it.”

Ned hugged his brother. His last sibling. “Or perhaps he did but Brandon was already held in King’s Landing.” 

“She should be here raising him. I would have taught him how to play swords - I was better than her when we were children, whatever she’d have you believe,” he smirked though the tears still flowed. Ned joined him. His face too was wet. 

“You still can.”

Benjen’s smile disappeared. “I cannot.” 

“Why?”

“I am joining the Night’s Watch like all other murderers and criminals.” 

“Benjen,” Ned gasped, wide eyed and shocked. “You cannot mean that. It is not your fault. If it is anyone’s fault it is the Mad King’s.” Even before the Defiance of Duskendale, everyone had known Aerys Targaryen was jealous and suspicious. Ned had grown up in the Vale and as such heard much of the gossip from court. However, he only descended into full madness after Ser Barristan Selmy had rescued him from Lord Darklyn’s hold. Ned had heard that Father, Jon Arryn and Lord Hoster Tully among other lords had planned to develop closer relations with each other and move further from the Crown. In the end they need not have. The King’s own son had seen the risk his madness posed on the realm. It was a well known secret that the prince hoped to hold a Great Council during the tourney to overthrow his father. 

“You can’t say that Ned,” Ben protested. “I didn’t say anything to anyone until it was too late.” 

“Look,” Ned told him, holding him by the back of the neck and moving close to him. “None of us, Lyanna included, could have predicted what happened. I was with Lyanna when she died. She had no idea.” Ned’s voice turned into a rasp toward the end of the sentence. Every time he spoke of Lyanna’s last moments her bed of blood and flowers came to his mind. 

“I still want to go,” Ben said. 

“You are still a boy, Ben. You do not know what you would be giving up.”

“I will take no wife and father and father no children. I know that. The prince was going to allow me to join the Kingsguard one day and he even said I didn’t need to be anointed by the seven oils. He said that Ser Duncan the Tall rose to become the Lord Commander despite never being knighted himself.”

Ned was taken back by this. “You spoke to him?”

“Twice at Harrenhal. He and Lyanna used to meet at the godswood there.” 

Ned nearly laughed. He used to meet Ashara there too. It seemed he and his sister were more alike than he knew. Harrenhal’s godswood was twenty acres and thick with trees, it was no surprise the hadn’t seen one another. 

“You can’t go.”

“Why not?”

“You are my heir.”

“You already have an heir and Jon can be your spare. You should ask Robert to legitimise him. Raise him as a Stark.”

Ned thought of what his wife might think of that. He hoped one day to tell Jon of who his father and mother were when he was a man grown. He would never leave the boy wanting and would, when he was old enough, arrange him a good marriage, all things considered, and leave him a holdfast of his own. He promised to protect him and keeping him away from all things related to the game of thrones was the safest thing to do for him.

“Ben, you can’t go.”

“I have to make my own way in the world, Ned. I committed a great act of dishonour. This will be my opportunity to do something honourable and to purify this stain on my honour... if not my conscience.” He sighed. “Besides,” he then smiled, looking at Ned, “the Night’s Watch is not all bad, brother. Do you remember that wandering crow who spoke to us at Harrenhal? Starks have manned the Wall for centuries. I want it brother. You have to let me go.” 

Ned considered his little brother. Benjen was a tall youth with the long Stark face they all shared and blue-grey eyes that were normally filled with laughter. Though it had been a long time since Ned had seen him laugh. 

“I will be so alone without you,” Ned whispered. 

“You will have your wife and son and soon Winterfell will be full of laughing voices.”

“Won’t you miss me?” 

“Always.” Benjen hugged him and the last two Starks in Winterfell stood embracing with tears in their eyes in the crypts that held all those who came before them. 

**\----**

Ned left Jon with his brother as he travelled South to collect his wife from her Father’s home. Even now as he rode through the Riverlands, Ned could not truly believe that he was not only a married man but a father too. Not long ago, he had been planning a future with Ashara and now the only future that lay ahead of him was with the graceful wife that waited for him at Riverrun. _A wife who wishes she married my brother. What a pair we make,_ he thought. _A man who dreams of another woman and a wife who wishes he was his brother. I wonder which one of us is worse._ He supposed it was him. He was pining after a living woman while Catelyn dreamt about a dead man- one she had been betrothed to since she was twelve. He knew he shouldn’t begrudge her that yet somehow he did. 

Martyn Cassell and Jory had ridden south with him along with their household guard. 

They had travelled for two weeks along the Kingsroad, camping along the road where they could and staying in castles along the way when they could. Before they crossed the Kingsroad for the River Road, they stayed a night at an inn on the crossroads. The innkeep was a fat woman with a red smile from chewing sourleaf. She was kind enough though and Ned liked her sweet cakes. _Brandon heard about Lyanna not far from here._

From there, they turned west along the River Road to his new wife’s ancestral home. On the way, they passed along the marketplace and a village a mile farther on from the inn. The village consisted of half a hundred white cottages surrounding a small stone sept. _This is the land of the Seven,_ he thought. He hadn’t seen many weirwoods. Riverrun had a slender weirwood in its castle grounds though Ned had married his wife in her father’s sept. South of here, the only other place he knew still had weirwoods besides Harrenhal was the God’s Eye. Princess Elia had told him that it was where Rhaegar had wed Lyanna. Princess Elia confounded Ned. If a woman with a bigger heart existed in this world, Ned had yet to meet her. He thought of the Dornish princess having to live without her children. Before he left Sunspear, she had promised him that she had no need of the throne. Given all he came to know of her, Ned believed her. It was her brothers he was worried about. 

Ned Stark rose against Aerys Targaryen to put an end to the murder of children. He had never thought that Rhaegar’s children would bear the brunt of what was once a righteous cause. They called it Robert’s Rebellion now, for he was the rallying figure of so much of what happened despite the fact that Jon Arryn had been the one to call his banners in rebellion first and Ned was the one who lost a father and brother and now a sister. Ned had been the one to rally the Lord of Riverrun and those of his bannermen who showed up, and then went on to lift the siege of Storm’s End. Ned wanted no glory for it, though calling it Robert’s rebellion because it was his betrothed that was stolen made him think of how annoyed his sister would have been. Yet for the safety of little Jon Snow in Winterfell, Ned would stay silent and let them say their words. 

Finally, they made it to Riverrun. The castle was a lot smaller than Winterfell but was unassailable in case of siege. It was built where the Tumblestone and Red Fork rivers met while the third side faced a massive man-made ditch that was filled with water to surround the castle with water on all three sides. 

When the castle doors were opened Ned spotted his auburn-haired wife stood with her father, their household and their son. Ned rode across the drawbridge, leapt off his horse while his heart leaped up for joy at the sight of his son. He was a chubby child, red cheeked and blue eyed. Ned shook hands with his good-father, greeted Lord Hoster’s heir, Ser Edmure Tully. Lady Catelyn,...Stark now, greeted him with a bashful curtsy and smiled at him from underneath her eyelashes. He kissed her fair hand.

“My lady. It pleases me to see you.”

“I am glad to see you safe, my lord. I prayed for you every day.” Catelyn was a beautiful lady by all standards, fair skinned, blue eyed and with high cheekbones that she shared with her brother and father. 

“My lord,” she said shyly, “this is Robb. I named him after the king. I know the two of you are like brothers.” She handed him the boy. His bright blue eyes found Ned’s and he smiled, squealing sweetly with a laugh that was not yet sullied by the hurts of life. His smile cheered Ned’s soul and there and then Ned made himself a silent promise to preserve his child’s laughter. 

“He’s perfect,” Ned said in a voice thick with emotion. “Thank you, my lady.” Catelyn beamed at that and it seemed to him that she was pleased to see him. He thought of Ashara then and of how she told him his wife was waiting for him. He felt foul for even now he was thinking of another woman. 

“I’m sure he will be a great Lord of Winterfell one day,” Hoster Tully winked. “Anyway, there’s no point standing here all day, I’m sure you’re in need of rest Ned,” 

“I will show you to your rooms, my lord,” Catelyn said. “And to you all,” she continued speaking to his men, “I welcome you to my father’s hearth and home. Jory and Martyn it is a pleasure to see you again and to the rest of you _sers,_ I look forward to getting to know you all.” Whatever he might think of Lady Catelyn, Ned saw that she was never without her courtesies. She offered them all bread and salt and led them inside the keep with the castle’s steward in tow. All the while, Ned’s attention was focused only on his son. _Robb._ He was a smiley baby and when Ned slid his small finger into his open hand, his son grabbed it, laughing loudly making all who came across him smile. Ned thought of how different he was from Jon back in Winterfell, a sombre baby if ever there was one. He was quiet in his curiosity and while his smiles were rare they made Ned as happy as Robb’s did. He wondered whether the circumstances of their birth determined their nature. Robb was born behind the strong walls of his grandfather’s castle while Jon was born in a small tower in the Red Mountains, along the Prince’s Pass. He also wondered what his lady wife would say when he mentioned that he had a bastard. 

“My lord,” she said, leading him to a room, “these are my chambers. I wasn’t sure if you wanted us to share or not so I had space made for you here, although there are empty chambers next to mine as well. I’m sorry if I was being presumptuous,” she added shyly. 

“Not at all, my lady. I would be happy to stay in these chambers with you.” That made her smile. If they were to spend the rest of their lives together he could not deny such small courtesies. _And I’ll never have Ashara again._ He was going to tell her he fathered a bastard, he supposed he might as well try to make her happy before that even if she would much prefer his brother to him. 

“I am sorry about Lady Lyanna. Lysa told me that she passed.”

“Yes,” Ned sighed. “Thank you, my lady.”

“Only a horrible man would do such a thing.” She then caught her tongue before she said too much and said, “I’m sorry, my lord, I seem to be getting ahead of myself. I’ve had the servants draw you a bath, my lord. We will then sup in the Great Hall with my father...if you are not tired.”

“That sounds pleasant, my lady.” Ned knew he sounded a fool but he knew not what to say to his wife. He had never been one of many words and especially not where ladies were concerned. Ashara had always laughed at him for that, but never in a mocking way. She said she found it endearing and that she could talk enough for them. He had never tired of her words. 

“My lord,” she said, breaking him out of thoughts he shouldn’t be having, “I sewed you this tunic. I thought you might wear it...if you wish.” It was a white tunic embroidered with the snarling wolf of House Stark. On the cuffs he saw his lady wife had sewn their initials. Ned rubbed his fingers on the embroidery. 

“Thank you, my lady. I would be honoured to wear it.”

Sitting in his warm bath Ned remembered the last, well only thing, Ashara had ever sewn him. It was a tunic not too unlike this one. It too had a wolf embroidered on it but only on the cuff. The wolf was howling at a falling star. The last time Ned had worn that tunic was on the day they fought the Battle of the Bells. After Jon Connington wounded Lord Hoster, Ned had removed the tunic and used it to stem his good-father’s bleeding. It was the last time he ever saw it. Ned thought it sardonic that his separation from that shirt was linked to the man who brought an end to him and the woman he loved. 

Even in winter, Riverrun was too hot for Ned. He had the window open and from where he sat in his bath he could see the Riverlands laid out in front of him for leagues ahead. 

When he was dressed, and his child put to sleep, Ned Stark followed his lady wife through the godswood to dine with her father and brother in Riverrun’s Great Hall. Like the keep itself the Great Hall was also triangular in shape. Tonight, they were dining in a private audience chamber above the hall. When they sat, Lord Hoster Tully rang the bell for the servants to begin serving their supper. Hoster Tully was a tall, broad man with blue eyes and brown hair, unlike his children. Though it was streaked with grey. 

“Jon Arryn has been named Hand of the King.” Hoster Tully offered. “My daughter Lysa has gone to court with him. Should she be expecting Catelyn to join her?” “No, I should not think so, my lord.”

“Well, why not? You fought beside Robert, everyone knows the two of you were close. It would do your house well to serve at court.” Ned knew by extension, Lord Hoster Tully meant his house too. 

“It would be sweet to see Lysa again.”

Ned hated that he had to disappoint his wife. Again.

“My brother Benjen has made the decision to join the Night’s Watch, my lord. Unfortunately, I cannot serve at court. There must always be a Stark in Winterfell.” Truthfully, Ned had no intention to return there. He was yet to speak to Robert again, though the king and Jon Arryn had sent him condolences for Lyanna’s death. 

“My lady,” he added, tentatively placing a hand upon hers, “if you wish to visit your sister, you have my permission.”

“No, no, Cat knows her place is next to her lord husband.” His wife simply smiled shyly at him. 

“I hear it was you who saved the Dornish princess.”

“I was not alone in it, my lord. My men were with me.”

“It’s a shame what they did to the children,” Edmure commented sadly. “There was no need to do that.”

“Call it a mercy. They will not grow to raise a rebellion now.”

“Father, they were children. A three year old and a baby.”

“It was unmerciful to kill them,” Lady Catelyn joined in. “They could have sent the boy to the Night’s Watch when he grew up and the girl to the Silent Sisters. They could have served the realm well and not have children who would threaten King Robert’s reign.”

Ned thought of Jon back in Winterfell. He wondered what his wife would say if she knew of who his parents were. Could he trust her with that knowledge? If a day were to come when she felt that to share that knowledge would save someone she loved, would she retain it? He wasn’t so sure. 

“I hear Ser Willem Darry stole away with the Mad King’s son. The Queen died birthing a little girl who did not live long. Bloody Darrys always playing the hero. The boy will not live long on the run. Better to send him off to the Wall, as Cat said.”

“Prince Viserys is eight.”

“Boys grow to be men.”

“Ser Willem is not only risking his life but the lives of all those who harbour him,” Catelyn added. “It’s such a sad state of affairs. I feel for both the poor boy and the old knight.”

That night, Ned lay in his wife’s bed, staring at the ceiling. There was no way he could tell Lady Catelyn Tully about Lyanna’s boy. From this day forward, to everyone he may meet, Jon Snow was his son and his son alone. 

“My lord, are you alright?” she asked him, sitting up.

“Yes, my lady.”

“Please. Call me Cat. If we are to be married we should call each other by our names.”

“Well, in that case, please call me Ned.”

“Well met, Ned,” she smiled. “Would you care to share what troubles you with me? I hear a good marriage is built on sharing counsel.”

Ned inhaled deeply, looking once more at the ceiling. He sat up and faced his lady wife. Not all lies were without honour. “My lady…” he gulped. It was easier to think about saying this than to say the words. The moment they left his lips he would dishonour himself for his entire life. Yet he had no choice. He did not know this wife of his enough to trust her. 

She took his hands. “Whatever it is, my lord,” she said returning to her courtesies, “we swore vows to one another. From that day on we were sworn to one another.” That just made him feel worse.

“I’m not sure it’s something you will forgive so easily, my lady.” He willed himself to finish his statement. “I have a bastard.” 

Her mouth shifted from a smile to a grim line. Her warm eyes turned cold and she removed her hands from his. Returning them to her lap, she simply said, “Oh.”

“My lady-“

“Do you plan to legitimise him?”

“No, my lady.”

“So Robb will be your heir.”

“Of course. He is trueborn.” _And my only son besides._

Catelyn Stark stared at him with judging eyes that made him want to shrink back for what seemed to be an age. “I have heard it is something many men do, my lord, when away at war. You did not know me and I did not know you when we married. I understand… you have a man’s appetites. I only ask..” she fiddled with her fingers, “I only ask that you do not embarrass me in this way again.”

“I promise you, my lady, I will not.” Even as he said that he thought of Ashara and his last night with her at Starfall when he wished she would kiss him. He wondered whether if she had, he would have lost himself inside her to make another child. _Even if I would then, I cannot now. I made a promise._

Soon thereafter they began their trip back north. Lady Catelyn was still quite cold with him, though she remained ever courteous. They had not lain together since the night of their wedding. 

They stayed once more, on their journey north, at the inn at the crossroads. Ned and his wife were sharing a room with a featherbed at the top of the narrow stairs. Cat, as she liked to be called, had somewhat loosened up to him and was telling him about her many trips throughout the Riverlands as well as her many stays in this inn. 

“Masha’s honey cakes are to die for,” she whispered, “but I didn’t like asking for them because her smile always scared me.” She giggled a little and their son copied her. 

“She threw herself right off the Palestone Tower, she did,” he heard someone say when Cat went upstairs to put Robb to sleep. “I ‘eard, Lord Stark returned Ser Arthur Dayne’s sword after killing him and that the Lady Ashara threw herself off the tower in grief for the brother she lost.”

Ned Stark’s felt a tightening in his chest. His ears began to ring and his vision began to blur. He felt dizzy and found it hard to breathe. He rubbed his throat, and inhaled and exhaled deep breaths that felt shallow. Slowly, like a drunk, he stumbled out of the inn. His limbs felt numb and his body tingled all over. 

“Lord Stark,” Jory called out. “Where are you going?”

Ned Stark leapt on to his horse, riding in the night rain until he got utterly lost. He rode until his tears and the rain had run as one. Ashara was dead and all because of him. How many deaths would be on his conscience? He should have told her the truth. Ashara would never have betrayed it.

He screamed into the cloudy night that blocked out all the stars. His shout of pain was swallowed by the thunder. That night he sobbed the kind of desolate sobbing that only one who had felt they had lost everything did. He sank to his knees on the muddy forest floor, not caring one bit about his riding leathers. His tears continued streaming down his face, mingling with the rain. He did not think he would ever get over the pain of Ashara’s loss. _I killed her._

He looked up at the watery skies gasping for some hope, but now no stars appeared in the cloudy sky. Ashara was gone and he was to blame. He sobbed until there was nothing left inside of him but a crude emptiness. His puffy eyes were a scarlet red and his whole body felt limp and heavy. When the sun rose the birds sang and the sun came out but the wolf who howled for the stars felt dead. For him he felt there was no beauty left in the world. Yet when he finally made it to the inn, he saw his wife awaiting him with Robb in her arms. His son squealed when he saw him. 

It had taken them another two weeks to get back to Winterfell and still Ned’s grief had not run its course. The heaviness he felt in his heart, he felt in his limbs as well. It showed itself in his body as a deep lethargy. He made a terrible travelling companion and an even worse husband. Lady Catelyn made an effort to try and comfort him. One night she lay with him and when he was done he looked at his lady wife. Her hair fell in auburn ringlets about her pale skin, so beautiful, but Ned barely noticed it. He thought of another woman, dark haired, fair skinned although in his mind’s eye he remembered her as she was at Starfall, kissed by the sun. Lady Catelyn spoke to him but he thought of Ashara’s words that he used to drink in like summerwine. _Stop it,_ he reprimanded himself. _Ashara is gone but Catelyn is here. Do not punish her for your own failings._

Finally, the grey walls of Winterfell appeared before him. “Welcome home, my lady,” he said smiling at her. It was a feigned one but he had to show her kindness. She did not choose this marriage either. He wasn’t her preference either but they were stuck together now. He had killed Ashara himself. 

One by one he introduced his wife to the main household staff and to Benjen who he was distraught to see was ready to leave the following day. 

Then Wylla stepped forward, with Jon in her arms. Ned had only been gone just over a month but the boy had grown and on this day had a smile on his face. Robb in his own mother’s arms extended his pudgy arms out to the other child. Ned picked him up. 

“Robb, this is your brother, Jon.”

Ned saw Catelyn’s jaw clench. “Are you his mother?” she asked Wylla. 

“No, my lady.”

“Wylla is his wet nurse.”

“And his mother?”

“Will not be in our lives. Jon is my son and I will raise him here.”

Catelyn asked for her own son and for permission to retire. “I am tired, my lord.”

That night he stood above Jon’s cot with his brother, both of them watching over Lyanna’s trust. They shared no words. Ned put his arm around his brother’s shoulder and lay his head there. It had been a long time since he had the support of someone - even if it were his little brother and this was their last night together before Ben left. 

The next morning Ned had bid his brother a formal goodbye and when Benjen rode off, Ned walked a route he had oft-taken as a child. Wordlessly, he sat on the floor beside her rocking chair, put his head on her lap and sobbed silently. Just as he had when he was seven and Mother had died. Once more Ned Stark felt utterly alone. Old Nan put her hand on his head and stroked his hair. “It will get better, child. It always does with time.”

Ned wasn’t so sure. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cat stayed comparing Ned to his brother after fifteen years of marriage. I think we’ll allow Ned to compare her to Ashara for a few months. I feel like generally he has a better control over his emotions (apart from his compassion for children which comes from the PTSD of seeing dead Rhaenys & Aegon).  
> Hoster Tully is a little turd and a terrible man. I don’t care if (2 of) his kids loved him. The man not only forced Lysa to abort her baby, he put a whole village to death during the rebellion. Jon Connington isn’t my favourite character but at least he was trying to ensure he didn’t kill innocent people at Stoney Sept.  
> Edmure Tully deserves more respect. Okay I know he likes drinking and wenching but the man is a man of the people and really, he’s just a young man who grew up on the stories of his great knight uncle and has not yet had a chance to emulate those glories. He could have cut off Tywin’s retreat had Robb seen fit to share information with him & would’ve become a hero of the war of the five kings but alas, we are where we are. Not many lords would bring their people behind the castle walls during war. Most would think about how people would eat through their granaries. I mean it’s what Cat thinks. “‘Who are all these folk?’ ‘My people,’ Edmure answered. ‘They were afraid.’ Only my sweet brother would crowd all these useless mouths into a castle that might soon be under siege.” I get it it’s not strategic but he has a big heart.  
> I know, I killed off the mother of dragons. I just didn’t have somewhere for Dany and her dragons in this story since the white walkers took a nap


	7. Catelyn & Eddard

**Catelyn - 284 AC**

_Family, duty, honour._ Catelyn always put her family first and she had always done her duty to them, aiming to do it with honour each time. She was the third child of Lord Hoster Tully and Lady Minisa Whent. She had two older brothers but both had died as children. So Cat had grown up being her father’s eldest, his son as well as his daughter. She used to travel all across his lands with him, travelling to every keep in the Riverlands. His heir for all to see. And when her mother died she stepped into her shoes. 

“You must become the Lady of Riverrun,” Lord Hoster Tully said. 

“Yes, Father,” was her reply. It was always her reply to his requests. When she was twelve he told her that he had arranged a match for her with Brandon Stark, heir to Winterfell, a land she had never been to. She thanked him for making her such a good match. And when she met her betrothed she had all but fallen in love with him. Brandon Stark was grey-eyed, tall and strikingly handsome. He made her smile but even if he had not she would have done her duty as her father requested. The day she heard he died, Catelyn had cried and cried for an age. She wondered whether her father would arrange her a match with one of his bannermen, perhaps Lord Mallister or Lord Bracken’s heir or perhaps even a Blackwood. Her nightmare would have been one of Lord Walder Frey’s gaggle of sons. If she married one of them her children would never inherit anything of note. Still, she would have done her duty nonetheless. Cat knew her father needed to strengthen his hold on the Riverlands. The river lords were a quarrelsome lot and the hold of House Tully on the Riverlands had always been a little shaky as loathe as she was to admit it. The Blackwoods, Brackens, Freys and Vances had more men than they did, the Mallisters had a more distinguished lineage while the Mootons were far richer than they were. 

To her surprise however, her father had arranged her a match, as custom sometimes demanded, with her betrothed’s brother. She had never seen Eddard Stark before the day of her wedding. She was expecting a younger Brandon, just as dashing. The man she married was shorter than his brother and not as handsome. She _was_ disappointed by his looks. Come to think of it Cat thought the only thing he had in common with his brother was the name Stark and their grey eyes, though even those weren’t similar. Brandon’s held a warmth to them whereas Eddard’s were as cold as the land from which he hailed. As cold as he was. He remained courteous enough with her in the short fortnight they had together at Riverrun. Even at their wedding his closest friends were more warm to her than him. On her wedding night, before the bedding, Jory Cassell had torn her gown, and Lord Dustin had shown her more desire than her own husband did when he saw her naked and declared to her husband when he saw her breasts that he wished he had never been weaned. That night her husband had done his duty as had she and in the morning her bloodied sheets were presented for all to see. That night they made her son, Robb, heir to Winterfell but she did not lie to herself and think that what they did that night was a result of passion. The moment they were done, her husband had left her chambers and she had welcomed it. She did not particularly enjoy the prospect of lying with a stranger but Catelyn had been a dutiful if nothing else. 

Then not even a fortnight later he rode off to war, leaving her to see through nine months of swollen feet, pains, bloating and a long childbirth. Still, she had done her duty and produced an heir to Winterfell after so many of his family died. She kept reminding herself that she had gotten the better deal out of her and her sister. Lysa had been married off to Lord Jon Arryn, Lord of the Vale of Arryn and a man of great influence. He was also twenty years older than their father. When they were little girls, Cat had been very close to her sister. They used to share gossip, and practiced kissing with their father’s ward Petyr Baelish. 

“He tried to put his tongue in my mouth,” Cat told her one night.

“I liked it,” Lysa giggled. 

When Catelyn was betrothed to Brandon Stark, Lysa had hoped for a match who was just as handsome. Her sister had loved songs and the dreams they sold. Ser Jaime Lannister had once visited Riverrun for a fortnight during which he was sat next to Lysa at every meal. The lord of Lannister’s son was a handsome youth even then but for some reason by that point Lysa seemed as disinterested in him as he was in her. The boy had been more interested in Uncle Brynden’s stories about the War of the Ninepenny Kings. 

_From a potential match with the golden son of Casterly Rock, she was married to a man who could have been her grandfather._ Cat did not think her sister would get many of the kisses she liked very much. Her husband had already lost some of his teeth by the time they married. _Still, Lysa’s son will be heir to the Vale and mine would be the liege lord of the northern houses._

Cat had no cause to truly loathe her husband. Neither of them had chosen their match and he had proven himself kind enough. When they came to Winterfell he had commissioned a small sept to be built for her even though he did not follow her gods. The Septon brought here had no big congregation. Often, it was just her and him so he spent more time in the library but Cat appreciated her husband’s effort. 

Since he brought her to Winterfell, he had warmed to her somewhat, asking her for her advice in household matters. He had allowed her to do whatever she wanted in running the household and she revelled in the freedom. She thought that one day she could love him truly. He had spent more time in her bed and she had welcomed him there. 

When she complained of the cold, he had her moved to the warmest chambers in the keep. Even in winter she seldom felt the need to start a fire. Winterfell was built on hot springs that kept the walls of the Great Keep warm while open pools smoked all day in the Keep’s courtyards. As cold as it was outside, Cat never lacked for warmth in Winterfell’s grey walls. Though she missed her siblings, the heat of these walls reminded her of the summer of her childhood. Her husband could never abide the heat though. Whenever he rolled off her he walked over to the window and threw open the heavy tapestries on the window, standing naked and cooling in the night air. She enjoyed watching him in that way. He seemed unburdened when he stood there. He always looked up at the night sky when he did so and she oft wondered what he looked for there. Sometimes she thought he did so without knowing that he looked like he was searching for something there. 

For weeks now he had been travelling up and down the lands he inherited visiting the keeps of his bannermen and settling disputes. Cat in the meantime held down the fort in Winterfell working with the maester and steward on ledgers and granaries. 

The servants were polite enough but Cat knew they held little love for her and his bannermen held even less. She had no true friends here and her giggly maids clammed up the moment she walked into a room. The septon and her son were her only companions. Well, them and the old wet nurse that still lived in the castle. So she enjoyed his return. 

Cat was a Southron woman up here, one they saw as a soft stranger not made for these climes. The older ones among the small folk had been used to Lyarra Stark, Ned’s mother and his sister Lyanna. Cat had met Lyanna a handful of times and could see how different the two of them were. Cat did not know her very well and Ned did not speak of her. She did not blame him. His poor sister had been stolen and raped by the Silver Prince. But Cat knew Lyanna shared her brother’s fire and Cat was a quiet woman, at least here where she knew no one. _Perhaps they take my quietness for indifference._

She knew, though they might not have said it, that his bannermen hoped that Ned would’ve made a match with a Northern girl. She tried hard to fit in here electing to braid her hair in their simple fashions, wearing simple dresses that so often held the Stark colours to show them that she too was one of them now. She had to do that so that their disdain for her did not reflect on her son. He would one day sit in his father’s stead and it would do him no good to be seen as Southron spawn not when he was a Stark of Winterfell.

A loud knock came at the door.

“Who could it be? At this hour of night,” she said, annoyed. 

“Who is it?” Ned called out, wrapping his robe about him. Catelyn hid further under the covers.

Martyn Cassel’s voice came through. “My lord, it’s the little one. He is unwell.”

Her nakedness forgotten, Catelyn jumped out of the bed running to the door. She threw it open and fearfully asked, “What happened to my son?”

The thick beaded Captain of the Guards did not look at her once, his eyes were levelled at his lord. They seemed to be having a conversation with their eyes alone. One to which she was not welcome to. 

“My lord, it’s Jon. The maester…” he looked down sadly, “thinks it might be the sweating sickness.”

Cat saw the colour drain out of his face and when he began to stride out of the room, she shut it closed in Martyn Cassel’s face. “No.” She knew he was foolish enough to go to the boy. “No. You cannot. The sweating sickness spreads easily. You cannot.” She realised she was crying. “You cannot die Lord Stark. Not now. Your son is alone and you have no other heirs.” She could not survive here alone. 

“I need to go to Jon.” He tried to move around her but she would not let him throw away his life for a bastard.

“The maester is with him. There’s nothing you can do for him except pray.”

“I need to see him.” When she threw herself upon the door barring it closed with her outstretched arms he began to pace. “My lady,” he said finally, marching across to her, “I need to leave. Please, move.”

“You cannot...Robb, your son, needs a father. I cannot raise him in the north alone. Think of your family.”

“Jon _is_ my family,” he ground out. She saw tears in his eyes. His jaw was tense and she could see him grinding his teeth together as he ran his fingers through his hair. She knew he would not push her out of the way so she stood there, barring his exit. He would not die for the bastard. Not when her son was still only a year old and in need of a father. 

“My lord,” she pleaded, trying to coax him out of this mood. “Maester Luwin is locked away with him. Let him do his job. There is little for you to do. Please do not risk yourself or your son. He needs his father as well as his mother.”

“Jon has no mother. I am all he has left,” he said, his lips quivering. “I cannot lose him.” She stared at him, half in disgust and the other half in betrayal. He had lain with a woman after marrying her. Cat did not expect him to love her, not when he had been strong armed into the match. She would have even forgiven his actions had he kept the child tucked away but he brought him to Winterfell, settled him here long before her and his heir. It hurt to even swallow as she stood there. She felt as if a ball had lodged itself in her throat. Lords had bastards, it came with the territory but now as he sat there holding back tears, she wanted to scream and shout that the son he should be caring for was the one that she had birthed. _Your true born son._ She knew he loved the boy. She would not begrudge a man that but there was once a king, Aegon the Unworthy, who had loved his bastards enough to legitimise them. The realm had bled for nearly a century because of that folly. Bastards were devious and sneaky. The boy may be just a child now but he could one day grow to be a threat to her boy. She could not let that happen. 

In the end, he stood and moved her out of the way, marching out without a word. She looked up at his empty eyes and out of shock that he would risk his life for the boy, she became pliant enough to be moved without much effort. 

She grabbed a robe and ran after him down the dark hallways of the Great Keep, barefoot and desperately flailing between care and rancour. 

“My lord, please you cannot.” She grabbed handfuls of his robe, not caring who saw her. “The boy is dying. You need not die with him.”

“I will not leave him to die alone.” His voice was hoarse though he had not shouted once. 

“And what do you think you will do for him, my lord?” she challenged, letting him go. “Are you a maester my lord? Do you know how to treat the sweating sickness? 

Do you know what it does to a person? It starts very suddenly, Lord Stark. A headache, perhaps some pains in your joints and it always comes with a great exhaustion. That lasts less than half a day. Next comes the sweating, followed by delirious babbling, thirst and a desire to sleep. Those who do sleep never wake back up. It’s a shame that it may happen to the boy, but must you die with him? You have a one year old boy. Robb needs his father and-“ 

He had regarded her with a scowl, his nostrils flared. She had never seen that expression on him. “You are a mother, my lady,” he said coldly, “I would have expected you to have a little mercy in your heart for a sick child.”

Cat bit her lip, trying not to cry as she watched him 

disappear down the hall. 

“I am a mother,” she bit back, “that’s why my concern is my own child. Wherever his mother is _she_ should be the one who is worried about her sick child. You should be asking yourself what kind of mother is she?”

Ned Stark spun around to her glaring at her with his cold eyes. She was angry and didn’t care. Why couldn’t he see that he was being unreasonable? There was little he could do for the child. He opened his mouth to speak when the maester’s door opened. 

“My lord,” the Maester said, “Jon simply has a fever. He does not have any of the other symptoms associated with the sweating sickness. I thought for a moment he might but he seems to have had no new symptoms in the last few hours. The sweating sickness starts suddenly and develops just as fast”

“Hours? Why was I not told?” She heard the boy’s cries and Lord Stark rushed in the room to console him, ignoring anything that the maester may say. 

Ned Stark told her with his feet all she needed to know when he entered the maester’s chambers despite her crying out against it. He loved the bastard as much as her son. Her boy was still small and children died all the time. Were anything to happen to him, the bastard would be his heir. The bastard might have Winterfell instead of a child of her body. She hated the thought. 

She had come to care for her husband but try as she might she could never love his bastard. Not when he looked so much like her husband. Ned Stark doted on the child. Whatever he bought her son he bought the boy. And her son had also grown to enjoy his company. She’d catch them babbling to each other and stumbling on unsteady feet throughout the Keep. 

Her dislike of the child started as something small. She’d remind herself that he was just a child but it would grow with every passing day. It’d grow every time she saw her husband hold him, or laugh with him, or beam with happiness when he said the words “da-da.” It grew with every passing day that the boy looked more like a Stark with his discerning grey eyes. If a one year old could know she was not his mother, the boy did, for when he fell he’d seek comfort from the servants or Ned. He had come to her in those early days but she had weaned him off. Catelyn had always done her duty but it was not her duty to be a mother to a bastard. 

At first, she didn’t notice just how much it bothered her but her loathing of the child felt like a weed she watered every day with every perceived slight. It had grown strong enough to strangle her and she had nowhere to turn for her husband would not see her side no matter how well she tried to explain it. 

For weeks after the boy’s illness,Catelyn continued to do her duty, seeing to the running of the household and raising her son. They had not spoken about the boy or his mother again, though Cat knew she wounded Ned with her words about the boy’s mother. She did not think it was anything unreasonable to say. Even if she were born in a hovel somewhere with no last name of her own, Catelyn Tully would never be parted from her son. The only reason a woman should be parted from her child was if she were dead and Cat had no way of knowing if the woman was for Ned never spoke of her. Whenever she asked about his mother, Ned simply brushed it off saying she wouldn’t be in their lives. But she was. There, everywhere. Whoever she was she left so little of herself in her son and too much of Ned. Cat hated her for that. 

Her husband had only grown warmer to her after the maester confirmed that she was pregnant with another child. She hoped that this time the child would look like him. She wanted to fill this castle with so many trueborn sons that the bastard could never see Winterfell even in his dreams. 

This night they were hosting Lord Jon Umber and his heir at Winterfell. Though it was still winter, the roads were somewhat travelable. Cat had gotten everything ready and her husband had even complimented her. 

The Umbers rode into the Inner Castle. They were larger than most men Catelyn had seen in her life and she thought their sigil of a roaring giant was apt for the men who arrived in her home. She had lined up with her husband, their son and servants and of course the bastard who she had placed in the second row. 

Jon Umber had arrived with his son, called Smalljon, and his uncle Mors. Catelyn knew her husband had held them in great regard. Mors Umber had lost two sons fighting in Robert’s Rebellion. 

“Ned! Ha-ha! It’s good to see you,” Jon Umber hollered. 

“And you, my friend,” her husband smiled brightly. She had not seen many of those smiles on him. The Greatjon had been patting Ned, more like smacking him, on the back when he paused and bellowed, “This must be the little lord! I know a Stark when I see one.” Catelyn recoiled when she noticed that he meant the bastard. Her husband merely stood there and smiled. “This is my natural born son, Jon,” he corrected. “This is my heir, Robb and this is my lady wife Catelyn Tully.” The Greatjon lifted her off her feet in a hug that might on any other day amuse her but she could not forget his words. _I know a Stark when I see one_ , rang in her ears all night through every course of the supper. The men laughed with one another. Their voices faded into the distance. _I know a Stark when I see one_ . She saw them laughing with one another but could not for the life of her say what was funny. The anger came in waves, gruelling and stealing what little appetite she had. She grimaced at the table having little appetite for anything, their laughter included. The words felt like sharp shards in her gut, twisting with every memory. She had never felt whole in Winterfell but what she had began to build in this frozen land was shattered with only eight words. _I know a Stark when I see one_ . The words had sucked out the breath in her body and left her empty. With each passing moment, as they drank their mead and revelled in their merriment, Cat barely hid her scowls and anger and suspicion. _Would they choose the bastard over my son?_

When they all retired to their rooms, Catelyn paced from her room to her husband’s. 

“I want him gone.” Ned Stark had been washing his face. He lifted his wet face from the basin and looked at her confused. “I want your bastard gone,” she clarified for him. “I am not his mother and I will not raise him here. _You_ married me, my lord. _You_ took me from my father’s house and _you_ brought me here where I have no friends or anyone who cares for me. Yet I have stayed here. I have done every duty expected of me. I married you, I gave you a son, I have never thrown you out of my bed. Even now, your seed is quickening in my womb. I have obeyed you in every matter but I will not, I cannot have this child under my roof!” Angry tears streamed down her face. She breathed heavily, her chest moving with every inhale and exhale. 

“What has gotten into you?”

“Me? What has gotten into you? You care so little for your son or what your bannermen think. Jon Umber mistook your bastard for your heir. What do you think will happen when they grow up and your bastard seeks to usurp my son? Who will your bannermen turn to? My son, your _trueborn heir,_ ” she stressed, “or the bastard who looks like a Stark that one would know his heritage just by looking at him. Move him away now before an enmity begins between your sons.”

“The Greatjon mistook one child for another, my lady,” he said, placing his hands on her shoulders. “Jon is my blood, it is expected that he would look like me.”

“Robb is your heir. If you loved him at all, you’d see things from my perspective.”

“Do you doubt my love for my son?”

“I think you punish him for the mother you don’t love and you love your bastard because you preferred his mother to me. Who was his mother anyway? A camp follower? A wench at a tavern or perhaps you had some great love you lost.” Cat did not know where she got her bravery from but once she started she could not stop. “I may not be your preference Lord Stark, but Robb is your heir and Winterfell is his birthright. You have to send Jon away so that your bannermen get used to seeing him with you.”

“My lady, the boys are scarcely a year old.”

“Fine,” she conceded, “You do not have to send him far. Perhaps, Lord Cerwyn could have a place for him. It’s only half a day’s ride away.” It was not unusual for lords to have their bastards raised in a bannerman's keep. 

“Jon belongs here,” were his only words before he marched away from her and to the cold crypts that held his ancestors.

“Who was she?” she cried out after him. “Why do you love her son more than mine?”

She noticed two maids gawp at her. Ned Stark walked towards her, grabbing her by the elbow and marched her once more into his chambers. 

“I bid you to watch your voice, my lady,” he chided her. “I do not know how you do things in the Riverlands but we do not make a show of our misgivings here to the servants. Jon Umber made a simple mistake. I corrected him. I have told you before. Jon’s mother will never be in our lives. Do not take out your anger at me on that child.” He left her alone and agitated. Whatever she did, she realised then the bastard would always be in their lives. 

The next day she was walking back from the sept when she heard two giggling maids whispering about Ned. She stepped into the shadows to avoid being seen and listened to their conversation, feeling a fool eavesdropping on her servants. 

“My Gerry said Lord Stark loved another Southron lady. Dame or Din… whatever. She was from Dorne according to Gerry and Tim and she was the sister of one of the Kingsguard. A famous one.”

“Well, they’re all famous. There are only seven of them at a time”

“Look at you knowing all things about the Southrons.”

“I ‘eard the Septon tell the story to my boys once is all.”

“Gerry says Lord Stark fought the brother to death to rescue Lady Lyanna. Gerry said he had some sword with a name too, like _Ice_. Gerry says when he defeated him, Lord Stark went to the lady’s castle to return her brother’s sword. He said he heard the lady killed herself. Now, I don’t know if it’s grief for her brother or her son that she flung herself off a tower, but I would think it’s the son. Men come and go.”

“He must have loved her a great deal. He never lets the boy out of his sight.”

“It would explain the Dornish wet nurse too,” the second replied, folding the rushes in her hand. 

Cat snuck back out of the shadows feeling faint. From the parapet she watched her husband in the yard, playing with her son and the bastard. He extended his arms to both children and bid them come to him. The bastard had run faster than her son and Ned had embraced him warmly, planting a tender kiss on his cheek before doing the same for Robb. Then he looked up and saw her. He nodded at her in recognition and she did the same.

She wondered whether her cool husband had truly loved Ashara Dayne. Cat remembered her from one of her few trips to court. She was a lady-in-waiting for Princess Elia Martell of Dorne. While Cat was tall, Ashara was even taller, slender and striking with purple eyes that invited awe. She was a beautiful woman. Cat wondered once more whether the fair maid of Starfall had once loved Ned Stark, a man of few words. There were many more handsome men at court. For all he had grown up in the Vale, Ned had neither their refinement nor the handsome looks she had seen in the likes of Ser Jaime Lannister, Ser Arthur Dayne himself and even Oswell Whent, a distant cousin of hers. She wondered how they even came to meet. And pondered whether her husband’s love for that woman was why he was cold to her. _Did he love her so much that he would keep her bastard by his side forever? Is this why he won’t speak of the boy’s mother except to say that she wouldn’t be in our lives? Well,_ Cat thought, _she cannot be in our lives if she’s at the bottom of the Summer Sea._

She had sat with these questions for two weeks before she marshalled up the courage to ask him about her. That night she had the servants make his favourite food and she’d worn one of her most revealing silk shifts. She wanted to make him forget everything about Ashara Dayne. Catelyn knew she was a beautiful woman, but she wasn’t sure she could compete with Ashara Dayne. It didn’t mean that she could not try. Ashara Dayne was dead and Catelyn Stark, for that’s who she was now, was a living, breathing woman, one pregnant with his second child. Ashara had only given him the one and even then hers was a bastard. 

**Eddard**

His wife wrapped her arms around his neck and sunk down onto him, engulfing him in her heat. She moved torturously slow above him, lost in her own ecstasy, her auburn locks flowing freely behind her back. Her blue eyes were closed, 

Ned trailed his lips from the corner of her mouth, up to her high cheekbones and then down to her jaw and lower still to her neck. She bit back a moan. “Ned,” she said instead, continuing to move at her slow pace. 

He gripped tightly at her hips, pushing up into her and taking a breast into his mouth. 

“Ned,” she sighed, spine arching into him. “Softly, please.” She raised her fingers to softly scratch through his scalp as his own hands trailed their way down to her ample behind, kneading it and being rewarded with the sound of her keens. He left one breast, to take the other into his mouth when she took his face into her hands, raising it up to her face. She opened her plush lips, sliding her tongue in where his lips parted for her kiss.

“Oh Ned,” she keened, against his lips, rising and dropping faster into him. He pulled away from her to take his thumb into his mouth to rub it where they joined. He wanted her to take her pleasure before he reached his peak. She card her fingers through his hair again, shutting her eyes and panting, quivering and close. Her fingers curled themselves around his shoulders. She let out a choked moan. The feel of her around him was so sweet. He too was close when he felt her flutter around him. She looked beautiful when she came apart around him. He came to her breathy moans against his lips with a groan of his own. 

He cleaned her up and went over to the window, letting himself revel in the night air. He looked up at the sky to see the sword of the morning bright and shining. The sight of it felt like a stab in his heart. A reminder of his crimes. He turned away from it and back to the bed. _Ashara is dead and it’s all my fault but I cannot die with her. I brought Catelyn out of her father’s home and I have a duty to her and my son and the child in her womb._ Unlike Benjen he could not atone for his sins at the Wall. 

Cat smiled at him, when he climbed in before laying her head on his chest. 

“When we were little,” she began, trailing her hand across his chest, “my father had a ward. A boy called Petyr Baelish.”

“Brandon duelled with him.” 

“He did. Before all that though when we were little, Lysa and I used to listen to the songs and the stories where ladies were saved by knights who would ask for a favor or a kiss. Lysa came to me one day and said, ‘If a knight were to rescue me, I wouldn’t know how to kiss him.’” Catelyn laughed. “I was eleven and she was nine. So we went to the one person we knew we could try it with.”

“Your father’s ward.”

“Yes. We practiced kissing with him. Nothing more than a peck on the lips. We were children, acting out what we heard in the songs. But my lord,” she smiled shyly, looking up to him, “I had never enjoyed a kiss until I married you.” She pressed a kiss to his lips. “Did _you_ practice kisses with girls in the Vale.”

“No.” It was the truth. Robert had wenched enough for the both of them and Ned had always been too shy. _Ashara was my first._

“Somehow I do not believe that,” she laughed. 

“My lady, I know you think me to be a lecher-“

“I said no such thing!” 

“I did not practice any kissing with girls in the Vale.” His first kiss with Ashara had been at Harrenhal and by the time they lay together in Gulltown there was no practicing about it. He closed his eyes. Even now he thought of her writhing under him. _She’s gone. Let her go._ But he could not. He remembered her as she was that last night in Starfall, telling him she wished they married. He _was_ a lecher, he concluded. He was in his bed with his wife and even now, a year later, he was still thinking of Ashara. _She was upset with me but she didn’t look like someone who would kill herself because of me._

“Not even Ashara Dayne?” The words yanked him out of his thoughts. “Is she Jon’s mother? Is that why you do not speak about her...because she died?”

Ned rose up suddenly, pushing her off him. “I told you before... _Never_ ask me about Jon.” His voice sounded cold as ice even to his ears. “He is my blood, and that is all you need to know. And now I will learn where you heard that name, my lady.” He had never allowed anyone to drag Ashara’s name through the mud, not even when she asked him to name her the mother of his bastard. He would not allow them to sully her name now, not when she was gone because of him. 

Catelyn told him she heard maids saying he returned Dawn to Starfall and that Ashara had killed herself because of it, though they thought she might have killed herself because he took Jon away from her. 

“I will never hear you say that name again and you will never ask me about Jon’s mother. I have told you before, Lady Catelyn.” His voice was severe. “Jon’s mother will never be in our lives. I am not asking you to be a mother to him. I only ask that you stop trying to dig into this matter.” He strode out of the room angry and unsure of who he wanted to level his anger at. Rage and resentment clouded his thoughts. He hated himself, he hated his wife’s attitudes to Jon and he hated the situation he found himself in. His feet guided him to the crypts, where he had statues erected for Brandon and Lyanna, he remembered so little of what his mother looked like. He wanted some semblance of the family he had to remain in Winterfell, though stone was a poor substitute for people. He stayed in the cold crypts, shivering in the freezing temperatures until morning. He had been back home in Winterfell for nearly a year now. His relationship with his wife had warmed somewhat. He tried to provide her with whatever she needed to be comfortable. He had brought her to a strange land and forced her to live with a son he named his bastard. But for the life of him he could not deal with the resentment she levelled at Jon, a poor child. 

The only time he thought of leaving his wife for the Wall was when she asked whether Jon’s mother was a whore he’d chanced upon somewhere. He wanted to do nothing less than smash her face against a wall. He would have done so were she a man but she was not. She was a lady and Ned Stark had never raised a hand to a woman. He would not start now. 

He considered telling her the truth of the matter more than once but every time he was prevented by her words in her father’s hall. “ _Ser Willem is not only risking his life but the lives of all those who harbour him._ Given the way she fret over Robb’s security now, with Jon as a bastard, he did not trust that she would not raise even more of an issue were she to find out they were hiding a Targaryen in their home. There was that and of course, there was her pride. He did not trust that she would not one day say that Jon was Ned’s nephew to protect her wounded pride. A misplaced word was all it would take for winter to come crashing down upon them. And then, were Robb’s life put on the line, he did not doubt she would throw Jon to the lions. He could not allow that. _I promised Lyanna._

The next day, he had words with the servants who spread tales about him and Ashara. He had ruined her life. He would not have her name associated with that of her killer. 

Exhausted, he made his way to the godswood and sat a long time by the Heart Tree praying and enjoying the peace he found away from the hubbub of castle life. He sat there with his head bowed. “… let them grow up close as brothers, with only love between them,” he prayed, “and let my lady wife find it in her heart to forgive…”

He heard footsteps approaching. It was Catelyn. 

“Ned,” she said softly.

“Catelyn...What is it?”

“A raven, my lord.” She held a scroll between her fingers. “From Sunspear. Princess Elia Martell is coming to Winterfell.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lysa is an unlikable character but I can’t help but feel sorry for her.
> 
> I know no one asked for Ned/Cat lmao, but Cat did say she asked him about Ashara in bed one night. I wanted to set the scene okay? I also wanted to show a shift in Ned’s attitudes somewhat as we're nigh on a year into their life together in Winterfell, at some point he will have started to warm to her. They had five kids after all. I’m playing with the ages so she’s currently pregnant with Sansa even though in canon she was not born for a few more years. 
> 
> I have quite complicated feelings about Cat as a character. Most of the time I cannot stand her attitudes to bastards. Her behaviour to Jon itself is inexcusable but her thoughts about Mya really rankled me. The girl was helping her and was nothing short of polite but Cat couldn’t see beyond her bastardy. Having said that, as hard as I find it to empathise with her I can’t help but feel sorry for her, especially at this stage of their marriage when she’s really doubting her place in Winterfell as well as Robb’s. I don’t think she’s right but you know what I get it. She lives and operates in a crappy world. It’s easier to live within its rules than break out of them.


	8. Elia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the slight delay in posting this chapter. I wanted to take some more time to draw up an outline for this story. The good news is I have at least 20 more chapters planned in detail but I still think that’s only 2/3rds of the story. I don’t have an end game for most characters yet.  
> As part of this rethink, I’ve made the decision to delete all references to Ned knowing about Aegon’s existence...there’s certain things he’ll do in the future that he wouldn’t if he knew Aegon was alive & I need him to do those things so this was the course of action that made most sense.  
> If you’re here for Jon & Arya...I think like Oberyn, below, you too will have to wait until your orange is ripe lmao. Arya hasn’t even been born at this stage. When the idea for this story came to me I wanted what became the first 5 chapters to just be a short prologue but as you can see, sometimes the story writes itself and Jon/Arya will be only one part of a (hopefully) richer tapestry of relationships and characters. You have no idea the glee with which potentially writing Cersei, Varys and even vile little Creepyfinger fills me with. In short, buckle up. We’re in for a ride.

**Elia: 283 - 284 AC**

For a baby, Lyanna Stark’s boy had a strong grasp. Whenever Elia held him, he would wrap his small fist around her finger and kick his pudgy legs in the air, cooing and gurgling and occasionally, smiling. Whenever he did, Elia would release a laugh that always teetered too close to crying. Rhaegar’s son reminded her of her own two babies. Rhaenys who giggled at so young and Aegon who loved her voice. The baby on her lap was both a balm to Elia’s heart and the source of a never-ending pang. Rhaenys, her oldest, her baby girl was gone and Aegon was still lost to her. And all she had in their place was their motherless, fatherless brother. She came every night to the nursery assigned to him while Lord Stark prepared for his journey north. She sat on the rocking chair her own mother had once sat at to watch the kingdom she ruled as she nursed her own children. She held Lyanna Stark’s boy to her chest and did for him what she hoped someone else did for her Egg. 

Her heart always felt afire. Sometimes she wondered whether she was slowly descending into madness like Helaena Targaryen who too once had to choose between her children. _One to save and one to sacrifice._ During the Dance of the Dragons, Blood and Cheese, two gutter rats, snuck into the Tower of the Hand and ordered Queen Helaena to choose between her two sons, elsewise they’d rape her daughter and kill all three children anyway. Helaena chose her youngest son to be killed. _She thought him too young to understand._ They killed the one she sought to save and Heleana turned mad. _They made me choose between Egg and Rhae and I have lost both my girl and my boy._ It had been months since she left King’s Landing and news was yet to reach her about where her son was. Lord Stark had been in Sunspear for three weeks now so it was nigh on three moon turns since she left King’s Landing. 

Elia told herself that she did not save Egg because she loved him more. _A mother cannot love one child more than another. I had to be practical. Rhae was three and her face known._ _One silver-haired baby looks like another,_ Varys had told her. _And yet an innocent child died anyway._ She blamed herself for not being strong enough to fight off Amory Lorch or Gregor Clegane but both were larger than her and stronger, and knights besides. _They didn’t call him The Mountain that Rides for no reason._ Elia could withstand them about as much as Rhaenys’ little kitten who was as unlike Balerion the Black Dread as any creature on earth. Elia remembered the first day Rhaegar had presented Rhae with the little kitten and smiled.

“What will you call him?” he asked her, moving a wisp of her from her face as he crouched down on the floor. 

“Balerion.” 

“But Rhaenys’ dragon was called Meraxes.” 

“Meraxes was green papa. _Balerion_ is black.” Even at such a small age, Rhaenys was not afraid of making her thoughts clear - and why would she? She was the sun and the dragon combined 

Rhaegar chuckled and when his eyes met Elia’s they smiled to one another on one of the last times she’d seen him alive. Her anger at him had still not abated, even as she held his son. Their relationship was never passionate but for a time they had been friends. Slowly as his father fell to madness, Rhaegar fell into a different kind of madness: an obsession with a dragon with three heads. He finally got what he wanted and lost it in the same fell swoop. _Three children, three heads. Now one is gone, another may join her and the third is left without both parents._

“Care for company, princess?” 

“Lord Glover, please, join me.” 

“Are you struggling to sleep too?” he asked her, settling himself on the bench opposite. 

“I seldom sleep.”

“Me neither.” 

“What keeps you up?” 

“I haven’t slept much since Brandon died. He was my brother in all but blood and name. When I try to sleep I see his last moments, the desperation, the regret and the shame that burnt in his eyes.” He sighed loud and long, rubbing his face. “And Lord Rickard…” Ethan smiled sadly, “He was a mountain to all of us, Brandon more than most. As wild as he was, his father’s approval was something he always sought. Something we all sought. Their screams, princess. I never forget their screams.” Elia remembered. The gold of Lord Rickard’s armour melted off his spurs and dipped down into the fire. Brandon Stark died watching his father burn and Lord Rickard burned watching his son choke to death. 

Elia looked at the babe in her lap. _One grandfather killed the other._

“I lived and better men died,” he whispered. 

Elia was unsure of how to make him feel better so she spoke of her ghosts. “I was singing to my daughter about the Bear and the Maiden Fair when the Lannister men began climbing up the walls,” she told him. “I told Rhaenys to hide under the bed but my daughter was only three. Her gasp when her cat ran out was how they knew she was there. My baby is gone and I am alive...I know that feeling more than most.” 

When she put the babe to bed, she walked round the castle walls with Ethan Glover, down the steps of the Tower of the Sun and up the steps of the Sandship. Below where they stood lay the Shadow City with its mud-brick shops, narrow alleys, hidden bazaars and stables, inns, and pillow houses. 

“Tell me about your home,” she said. 

He stood next to her, watching the torches of the Shadow City billow in the night air. “Deepwood Motte is not a beautiful castle, my princess,” he replied shyly. “Next to the Red Keep or Sunspear or even Winterfell, ours is a wooden hall not worthy of any consideration.” 

“I don’t care. Tell me about it.” 

“Well,” he began, “Our long hall sits on a hill, below which our stables, paddock, smithy, well and sheepfold in our inner bailey. Like I said, our castle is not all that. But once, long ago, in the Age of Heroes, it was the seat of our royal house.” 

“What do you do for fun there?” 

He laughed loudly when she said that and the sound made her smile. “The North is a hard place, my princess. In the summer we till our fields. We grow oats and barley and our vassals live within the Wolfswood, the vast forest that connects our lands, though one hundred leagues apart, with Winterfell. There, we hunt and we collect the wood for our fires...and sometimes for feasts we go to our vassals or across the Sunset Sea to Bear Island. I also have two brothers. Both of them got married recently, but the three of us were always close and they keep me busy. It is not the most entertaining of lives but we make do.” 

“And this Wolfswood...it spans the whole hundred leagues?”

“Yes.” 

“Why did you never marry?”

He looked away from the Shadow City below them, and at her. ”I have two brothers. Even if I have no children of my own, one of theirs could be my heir.”

That was the night before the northerners returned home. 

The next morning they sat together one last time to break their fast. They had spiced eggs, figs, olives, chickpea paste and peppers stuffed with cheese and spices. 

Theo Wull exchanged bawdy jokes with Oberyn, Ethan Glover sat in quiet conversation with Lord Stark, Martyn Cassell told her jokes and Howland Reed spoke at length with Doran, about what she could not say. 

“Princess...really? Even at this time of morning?” Martyn Cassel’s brow broke out in a sweat as he ate the spicy food for which Dorne was famous. Elia herself could not live without it, even in King’s Landing and Dragonstone. 

“Wash it down with a sherbet,” she advised him. Everyone at the table drank wine, occasionally choosing the sherbet. All but her brother Doran. Their father had gout and ever since Doran saw early symptoms in himself, he chose what he ate carefully with advice from Maester Caleotte who had been with them since the time their mother ruled Dorne. For years he had not seen the return of any symptoms of his gout. His only weakness, where food was concerned, were the blood oranges that grew in the Water Gardens. 

“My lords, Doran said in his princely voice when they walked the northerners to the walls of the city, “for the goodness you bestowed on me when you saved my sister, I will never be able to repay you. For as long as I live, you will have friends in Dorne. I pray that we will meet again and that this is only the beginning of our friendship.” He gifted them in gold, and wine and spices.

Theo Wull picked her up and spun her around, followed by Martyn Cassell. She screamed as if she was still a child, so small was she next to them. Ethan Glover kissed her hand and Oberyn narrowed his eyes. She was sure he’d have a name for him too. Then it came to Lord Stark and Wylla. Elia tied a golden bracelet on the baby’s wrist. In Dorne jewellery was given as a present given to every noble child. This one was a prince, even if the world would never know. 

“Stay in touch, Lord Stark,” she said, giving him a hug. After all they had been through together pleasantries should no longer be something between them. “They say friends made in difficulty are friends for life. You should know, you and Jon will always be welcome in Dorne.” Lord Stark only nodded at her. 

“Take care, princess.”

As she watched him walk over to his waiting ship, she thought of all the times she nearly told him that Aegon was alive. A day could come when her son was found and grown. A day when he would rise against Robert Baratheon and Tywin Lannister. If that day came Elia knew not where Lord Stark might stand. She only prayed that her son would never have to face him or Jon on the battlefield. King’s Landing had taught her not to trust anyone. The only people she had there were Ashara and her uncle, Prince Lewyn of the Kingsguard. It was only fear for her child that led her to trust Varys. The Spider was no friend of hers or Rhaegar’s. Were it not for his whisperings, Rhaegar would be king today and both Elia’s children would still be with her.

“Now your friends are gone, we should call the banners and fall upon the marches like rain. By the time he gets north, we would have destroyed Robert-“

“With what armies would we stand against all the kingdoms combined?” Doran asked. “Outside Dorne they believe our armies are larger than they truly are. We have the vainglorious Young Dragon to thank for that. He could only claim to be a great conqueror if he made our armies seem larger than they were. Making a baby a king will take years and careful planning. Prudency bears more fruit than reckless actions, Oberyn. We will need to study the board and the players of the game before we attempt to play...and when we do, we’ll play to win.” 

“Besides, Robert didn’t order my children’s deaths.”

“He approved them and that makes him just as guilty.”

“Robert’s time will come, but it’s Tywin who is the object of our vengeance, Oberyn. Never forget.” 

Doran stood on her other side. “And what is to stop Lord Stark from crowning his nephew before we crown ours, Elia? He has more allies than us.”

“It is not what he wants. He has lost two siblings, a child and the woman he loved. He wants peace and to be left alone. Leave him out of your games.”

“Why are you so calm?” Oberyn asked her, pulling at her elbow. “They tried to kill your children. They should not be sleeping soundly!”

“Do you think I forget?” she shouted back at him, voice hoarse with hurt. “My heart burns. It was _my_ daughter who died because of my inability and a precious babes’ brains were smothered on my clothes. Me, Oberyn! Me!” Rage filled her as she marched off, demanding one of the guards to give her his horse. She kicked the spurs and galloped off. She galloped over the dunes and beside the sea across the red-brown land that spanned all of Dorne. 

Of her two brothers, Doran was the head, calculating, prudent, studious. Oberyn was the heart, subject to flares of passion and intensity. The Red Viper they called him, a name he was given when he dueled the Lord of Yronwood. They only fought to first blood but Lord Yronwood died and from that day, all believed Oberyn had coated his weapons in poison. As different as they were, her brothers, when they came together, were deadlier than they were alone. Doran had once described them as a viper and the grass that hid it. Doran was pleasant and soft-spoken like swaying, sweet-smelling grass. _Long grass that hides the vipers within from his enemies until it was time for him to strike._ Together, she knew they would protect her son. In that analogy of her brothers, Elia herself was a winter sun. Beautiful to behold, a light and all that was good for life. She was a mother, it was in her nature to be so. Yet as surely as winter came, summer followed, and the sun burnt men to their deaths. When men lost themselves in the desert grass lands, they fell prey either to the vipers or to sun stroke. _The Young Dragon had the right of it,_ Elia thought, _the sun was more deadly than the spear._

Before long, she was at her destination. The Water Gardens lay three leagues west of Sunspear. Once there, she handed the reins of the sand steed to a guard, walked across the pink marble that paved the garden, through the courtyards, past the pools with the happy children and the blood oranges that were ripe this time of year. Finally, she came to the pillar gallery and the triple archway that separated the parts of the gardens open to the children from the private residences of only the Martells. There, she crossed a hidden courtyard, knocked three times in quick succession before waiting a beat for the last one. Here no visitors were permitted beyond Martells, servants Doran had carefully chosen and the guests that were already inside. 

“Hello, Arthur.”

Inside the building were eight rooms. Each of them large and airy with Myrish carpets and marble seats and a courtyard connecting them, inside which she saw Ser Oswell and Ser Gerold practicing with their swords.

“Where is she?” 

Arthur pointed out a room. From the door Elia could see her silky black hair. She was sat in front of a looking glass.

“He’s gone then,” Ashara announced matter-of-factly.

“Yes.” 

Ashara nodded. “Good.” Even as she said that, she clenched her jaw and her hands were in fists. 

“I don’t understand why you couldn’t just come here _with_ him. You sailed a day after us and you’d have had nearly a moon turn longer with him.” Elia took the brush from Ashara’s hands and took over from her. 

“I said my farewell at Starfall, Elia. Anything more would be scratching at a fresh wound before it could heal.” 

At Starfall, Ashara had truly blamed him for Arthur’s death and Elia could not watch her friend blame the man she loved for the death of another man she loved. So one night, she snuck in her bed and they shared a bed as they had so many times at Dragonstone. There, she told her that Arthur was alive and that Egg too was. “I want them to find my son,” Elia whispered. “One day he will take back what is his from those who sought to kill him. When he does he will need Arthur and Os and Ser Gerold.”

“And you will all need someone to make sure you don’t get in trouble.” 

Elia raised a fine eyebrow at her friend.

“What? I can behave...sometimes.” The words made her laugh. 

“I’ll go with you, my princess,” Ashara had offered that night when they went to sleep as sisters might. “To Essos and beyond. Arthur and I have never been separated for too long a time and Egg should have his favourite lady in the world beside him.” The two of them laughed once more when their eyes met. Egg used to pull on Ashara’s hair whenever she held him, giggling as he did so. 

“ _If_ he’s alive,” Elia whispered. 

“We have to believe that he is. You’ve been travelling for so long Elia, perhaps news awaits you in Sunspear.” 

Ashara had been her secret keeper. As children, they played in the Water Gardens together and then as adults their relationship was wrought in fire at Harrenhal and then with Ashara’s loss. Elia did not want the last time Ashara saw Eddard Stark to be clouded by a feeling of betrayal. Even a blind man could see how much the two cared for each other. By now, Elia knew the news of Ashara’s death would be travelling up the Prince’s Pass and into the green lands beyond their mountains. Elia told her friend that she didn’t need to “die” to disappear but Ashara was adamant that no one would look for or ask questions about the whereabouts of a woman who had thrown herself off the highest tower in her home upon the death of her most beloved brother. Everyone at court had known how close the two siblings were. It was no stretch of the imagination to believe that Ashara would not take his death well. 

“What about Lord Eddard?” she remembered asking.

“He has a wife,” Ashara replied then. 

“I told him to name me the boy’s mother but he refused.” 

“News will travel anyway,” Elia assured her. _And if the boy ever looks anything like Rhaegar, some of the Daynes of Starfall share his look. Eddard Stark would have an explanation._ Rhaenys had been born looking like a Martell of Sunspear, yet with age her brown eyes took on a purple glint in the light. If her youngest brother’s grey eyes ever did the same... _Ashara’s purple eyes are famous from here to the Wall._

She heard Oberyn’s fast steps and Doran’s more measured ones before she saw them. If anyone ever heard Oberyn coming it was because he wanted to be heard. Elia put the brush down and placed a pin in Ashara’s hair, turning to face the door the moment her brother walked in. 

Oberyn marched over to her pulling her in his arms. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled in her hair. “I want them to pay for every tear you’ve shed.” His commiserative face told her he regretted the words he said in anger. She smiled at him and he kissed her forehead. 

When they left Ashara’s chambers the seven of them sat under a pavilion, sheltering from the midday sun. 

“Any news on little Egg, princess?” Oswell asked. 

“I wish there was,” Elia admitted. When they separated more than a month ago at the Prince’s Pass, Areo had brought them back to the Water Gardens to await news and Elia’s return. Sunspear was a city with eyes everywhere. That Water Gardens were more secluded and this part more than most. 

“Princess…” Arthur said doubtfully, “what if this is a scheme of The Spider. What if…”

“He handed my boy to his new king,” Elia finished for him. “I trust him less than any of you, but I had no choice but to trust that he is protecting my son. He said he regretted his role in upholding Aerys toward the end...” 

Oswell scoffed. “He should have thought of that _before_ he destroyed the only hope the Seven Kingdoms had for a peaceful resolution.” 

Ser Gerold shuffled in his seat. He was famously loyal. The Kingsguard had three main factions toward the end. Rhaegar’s men: Oswell and Arthur and by extension Prince Lewyn who was her uncle. Then there were those men who took the words, rather than the spirit, of their vows to heart. Those were the Lord Commander Ser Gerold, Jonothor Darry, brother to Willem, and Ser Barristan Selmy and then there was theIr newest brother, Ser Jaime Lannister, taken into their brotherhood at just fifteen. The poor boy knew not half of the schemes cooked up in the red walls of the Red Keep. He was always the one who teetered too close to questioning the Mad King whenever he raped his wife and cooked people for jest. Were Rhaegar to take him into his confidence, she didn't think he would have failed him. He was always wide-eyed in respect for Rhaegar and his men. 

“What do we do next, princess?”

“We wait. We have no choice but to do so. No ship goes anywhere near Dragonstone without being under the watch of Stannis Baratheon,” Doran said, finally speaking. “The royal fleet is in Dragonstone. Fleetless, Robert has instructed his brother to build him a new fleet and assault the castle.”

“Over our dead bodies.” 

“Well, that can be arranged,” Doran threw back, “We only need to let Robert know you are still alive. What then? What of your vows to protect your king? Aegon Targaryen, Sixth of His Name is your king and ours. Will you leave him without protection?”

“But the queen is with child.” 

“And she has an entire fleet protecting her.” 

As they spoke, Elia remembered the night the Mad King had caused his wife to fall pregnant. He’d burnt his Hand, Lord Chelsted alive and strode to his wife’s room with a grin so vile. Killing people made the man amorous.

“I’m glad Jaime killed him,” she found herself saying. 

“Princess Elia that is-”

“Treason? I’m sure burning innocent people alive is worse,” she replied, taking a sip of her wine. “You were sworn to your king, Ser Gerold. I was not. Were it not for him I would have been on Dragonstone with my children the day King’s Landing fell.”

“You forget, sweet sister. The Lannisters were the ones who sacked the city.” 

“I do not forget, dear brother, but I was the one to see the regret on Jaime’s face.” 

“Mummers came in all shapes.” 

Somehow Elia wasn’t so sure. Jaime Lannister had kept her company when the two of them were kept in the Red Keep as hostages by Aerys against their families. 

They had waited for four more moon turns before they received news of Egg. A rider came in the night with a sealed scroll, though the seal had no stamp. The scroll only had three words. “Illyrio Mopatis. Pentos.”

“I’ll go,” Oberyn volunteered the moment they read the words. 

“It could be a trap. We can send someone else, someone they don’t know at court and the Kingsguard can await his arrival somewhere we control. We cannot let The Spider know where he is once we take him.” 

“Where?”

“Norvos. It is close enough to Pentos and vast enough to lose anyone following him. If the babe is indeed Egg.” 

“Brother, for the love you bear me, choose your words more carefully.” Elia’s heart thrashed against her chest with hope and fear. “I need to be hopeful...I will wait for him in Norvos too,” she volunteered. “Perhaps being closer to him will bring my heart some peace.” 

“If only,” Doran conceded. She gave him a questioning look. “As we speak, Jon Arryn is making his way from King’s Landing. Once he crosses the Boneway, the Wyls will keep him busy hawking, his banners are of a falcon after all. Lord Yronwood will feast with him and talk about trade and peace. At the Tor, he will be held back some more before the Tolands do more of the same. In that time, we will get the knights and Ashara out but you cannot be seen to be gone, sister. We will have to meet him as a united force.”

“Why would he come here?” 

“Apparently, he is bringing Uncle Lewyn’s bones home but that is something too small for the King’s Hand to travel all this way for.” 

“He seeks to either appease us or punish us.”

“Or both,” her brother corrected her, “Jon is a cautious man but they will try to cow us to ensure that we do not rise for Viserys.” 

Four days later, Areo sailed to Pentos with Lady Mellario’s brothers while Ashara, Oswell, Gerold and Arthur sailed for Norvos. They were joined by Lemore, a former lover of Oberyn and mother of his daughter Tyene. “He will need religious instruction,” Doran had reasoned. “People will not rise up for a child when a warrior like Robert has claimed the throne. He will have to return as a man of the faith and an honourable warrior when Robert’s ways destroy him...and they will.” Septa Lemore, for all she had once strayed with Oberyn, was dedicated to her scripture. Even when she was a babe, where other mothers read stories to and sang songs to their children, Lemore read from the Seven-Pointed Star to the third of the children Oberyn called his Sand Snakes. 

“This is his favourite blanket,” Elia said tearily to Ashara. “Remember to sing to him-”

“Every night. He likes to hold on to your hair when he falls asleep,” Ashara finished for her, hugging her.

“Remember,” Elia said, “Egg has a birthmark on his chest.” She hated that she had to doubt that the baby was her boy but she would not trust The Spider blindly until she ensured the baby was hers. The man was capable of anything. 

Elia stood watching the ships disappear into the horizons for a long time. 

“He will be safe in Norvos,” Mellario assured her, her own boy in her arms. Quentyn looked so much like his father and nothing at all like his fair mother. 

That night she fell asleep only after Maester Caleotte made her a draught. She hoped they would find her child and take him to safety. _Soon I will join him,_ she told herself. 

Shortly after their departure news arrived from Dragonstone. Queen Rhaella was dead along with the baby she birthed. Elia’s good mother had always been a kind woman who had made Elia’s time at court so much easier. She had once been friends with her mother and had taken Elia under her wing. When she had Rhaenys, Rhaella had showered her granddaughter with love even as her husband recoiled from her, saying _she smells Dornish._

She heard how the garrison at Dragonstone had intended to sell Viserys to Robert Baratheon but that Ser Willem Darry had snuck out with him under the cover of night, all while a storm raged and destroyed the Targaryen fleet. By now the commons spoke of how the wrath of Storm’s End had befallen the island. Before his death, Aerys in a fit of madness had named Viserys his heir. When Rhaegar fell, Aerys had convinced himself that Uncle Lewyn had betrayed Rhaegar on the Trident. As such, he vowed to disinherit Rhaegar and his line. “The Dornish bitch’s whelp will not have my throne when my own seed lives,” he scowled, levelling his demented eyes at her. By that point he had sent all his Kingsguard away from him, bar Jaime and his court was empty for by that point no one dared to venture too close to him lest they burned for a perceived slight . Lord Chelsted, his Hand and his most ardent supported was dipped in wildfire before he was set alight. No one wanted to be close to a man so volatile and no one, it seemed, seemed to care of his final orders. So far gone was he. 

Be that as it may, Elia hoped the little boy was safe. Viserys had been a pleasant enough child, even if he was particularly attached to Rhaella. 

For the next few weeks, she isolated herself from Doran’s court in Sunspear, choosing to stay in the quiet of the Water Gardens where the only noises were of the children splashing in the pools. Long ago, Prince Maron Martell had the gardens built for his Targaryen wife to free her from the dust of their ancestral seat. She filled the pools with her children and the children of nobles until one hot day when she allowed all children, noble and not to play there and ever since then the tradition had continued. Elia watched her brother’s heir, her seven year old niece Arianne, splash about the water with her milk brother Garin, one of the orphans of the Greenblood. There was Lord Dalt’s heir too as well as the heir of Spottswood and four of Oberyn’s daughters too. There was his oldest Obara, named for him, Nymeria, the daughter of a Volantene noblewoman he met on one of his travels abroad, Tyene, Lemore’s girl and Sarella, a beautiful child Oberyn had fathered on a captain of a ship. A princess, an orphan of the Greenblood, two heirs and four bastards played freely in front of her. Nowhere else in the Seven Kingdoms was that a norm. As she listened to their happy squeals, she sadly thought, _Rhae will never have the opportunity to play here._

She was joined shortly after by Ellaria Sand, Oberyn’s latest paramour, the natural daughter of Lord Harman Uller. They shared cheese and fruit and spoke at length in the shade. It was a well-known saying in Dorne that half the Ullers were mad and the other half worse. Ellaria was as far from that as anyone Elia had met and she had lived under the Mad King. Since he met her Oberyn had moved her to Sunspear and had confessed more than once that he loved her. Though that was not to say that he had stopped his...ways. Ellaria it seemed did not prohibit him and often partook in his activities with him. _Whatever works for them I suppose,_ she thought. 

When Lord Arryn finally arrived, Doran met him in the Tower of the Sun, sat under the dome of gold and leaded glass. Two seats were on the dais. One with the spear and the other the sun. Oberyn sat on the seat of the sun, and Doran as ruling prince took the spear. Elia sat under the dome, half in light and the other half in the shadows. 

“How have you found Dorne, my lord,” Doran lilted with a smile on his face. He had arranged every round of feasting, hunting and celebrations. 

“I’ve been hosted pleasantly by every lord along the way,” Lord Arryn smiled. 

Lord Arryn brought back their uncle’s bones speaking of the losses they had all sustained during the war. “I lost both my heirs,” he commiserated. “When we went to war, we only hoped to overthrow the Mad King. Viserys or Aegon could have been crowned, even after Rhaegar fell.” 

“But your king had other plans.”

“Robert wanted to see no children killed.”

“No,” Elia said bitterly, “just _dragonspawn.”_ He had the courtesy to shrink away. 

After that, began an inquisition from both her brothers. Doran’s were tempered questions and Oberyn’s veiled threats. 

“Why are you really here?” Oberyn asked. 

“I come with a proposal, my princes, princess... King Robert wishes to foster closer relations between Dorne and the rest of his kingdoms. Like King Daeron before him, he wishes to marry a Martell into the ruling family.” 

“He wants to marry the bride of the man he killed?” 

“No, my prince...he wishes to wed Princess Elia to his brother, Ser Stannis.” 

_The man who had sailed against my pregnant good mother._ Elia did not think a man as joyless as the young knight, Stannis Baratheon had ever walked the earth. 

“What’s to stop us...” Oberyn smirked menacingly, leaning forward as he did so, “from setting the Stormlands on fire and then blocking the Boneway and the Prince’s Pass? Remember if you will, my lord, our words…” 

“Dorne cannot stand alone,” Jon Arryn countered.

Her brothers exchanged smiles. “It wouldn’t be the first time a Baratheon was sent back with his tail between his legs. Orys Baratheon had once attacked Dorne and when he was freed, the Wylls took his and his men’s swordhands. To those who fell dragons, what is a stag but sweet meat?” 

“And the Iron Throne made Dorne bleed.” 

It seemed everything Jon Arryn said amused her brothers. “They burnt empty castles. Our people abandoned the castles and hid out in the deserts. These are our lands, my lord. House Toland has a dragon eating its tail on its banners as a reminder of those events. A falcon and a stag will not achieve what a dragon could not.” 

To his credit, Jon Arryn remained unflappable trying to make peace. His next offer was to ask Elia to come to King’s Landing to be a lady-in-waiting to Robert’s queen, Cersei Lannister. 

“That would please Lord Tywin.” Elia remembered how the haughty old lion once refused her Jaime Lannister’s hand because he thought her too low for his son, and he refused Cersei for Oberyn because he was saving his precious daughter for the future king. _He must have choked in anger when Aerys chose me for Rhaegar... I suppose he has a king for his daughter now._

“The offer comes from the queen,” Jon Arryn replied. “The Queen would like to create a harmonious realm.” Somehow Elia did not buy it. She never forgot the girl’s scheming smiles at Rhaegar and the way her eyes flashed green with hatred whenever she saw Elia at court. Elia’s relationship with her husband was not a passionate one but they were once friends and together they’d laugh at Tywin’s ambition and his insipid daughter. 

In the end, Elia could listen to no more of her brother’s back and forth with Robert’s Hand.

“I will not marry Ser Stannis,” she broke in abruptly, “I can give him no sons and I will not go back to the cesspit that is King’s Landing...there is only one man we both trust, Lord Arryn. You raised Lord Eddard Stark in your home, and I owe him my life. If your king must keep an eye on us, let his most trusted man keep an eye on me.”

Oberyn whipped his head around to her giving her a look of incredulity. _What?_ he seemed to scream. 

“Elia, you do not have to do this,” Doran consoled her. 

“My lord,” Oberyn said instead, turning his attention to Jon Arryn, “You look to be of delicate health...people die of sunstroke here all the time...and Dorne is so very full of vipers...not to mention the whole host of accidents that fall upon people who are not used to this land. How would Robert Baratheon cope without you?”

Elia cut in. “My lord.. I said what I have to say.”

“Ned is like my son.”

Oberyn began barking. She growled, “Later,” in Rhoynish. The language was banned in Dorne by those who wished to assimilate once but the orphans of the Greenblood still spoke the language in secret. Elia and her brothers all picked up words of the old language. 

“Since we both trust Lord Stark, my lord, I will marry a man of his choice and he will ensure the loyalty of Dorne. I trust that will make your king happy.” 

“Have you lost your mind?” Oberyn whispered in their ear as they walked to Doran’s solar. 

“Could we have some oranges?” she asked one of the servants. 

“They want you to waste up there, Elia.” This time, Doran joined in. “We do not have to accept this.” 

Elia squeezed each of the oranges. She handed Oberyn an unripe orange and Doran an overripe one and chose one just right for herself. The juices of Doran’s orange bled down his fingers. Oberyn scowled from the sourness of his own.

“You are too prudent, Doran,” she said, “An overripe orange grows mouldy and makes you sick...and _you,”_ she turned to Oberyn, “want to do things before we are ready. It will only leave a sour taste in our mouths and again, may make us sick. We have to wait until our oranges are just ready, sweet tasting and sweet smelling and enjoyed by all. We cannot act against Robert now but we can bide our time and wait until our oranges are ready. They will think us weak and unable. The joke is on them. I will not waste out there.”

“You want to marry that Northerner.” 

“He’s a nice man, Oberyn, and I am allowed my wants but I am more interested in what he can offer me. Deepwood Motte is surrounded by a hundred leagues of forest. Robert has built his own fleet. So should we. We will never rival the Redwynes but perhaps we can begin by doing better than Robert’s fleet.”

“If they see us build a fleet, they will know of our intentions before we act.” 

“That’s where you both come in,” she smiled, picking up a red dragon from Doran’s cyvasse board, “Your love of foreign women will do us well. No one will question the North trading lumber with Norvos or Volantis.”

“We do not have the money for a large fleet, Elia.”

“But your Lady Mellario’s father does.”

“Why should he help us?”

“His granddaughter will be queen.” 

For once she caught Doran unawares. “Egg will need Westerosi allies, Elia, we need to find him a bride outside Dorne...Lord Tyrell has recently welcomed a daughter.” 

“Excuse the pun, dear brother, but loose lips sink ships. The Norvoshi are more likely to protect their interests. Mace Tyrell is a coward who talks too much. He dipped his banners even before Ned Stark fell upon him with a battle weary army at Storm’s End. I would not trust that man with my son” 

“It’s true,” Oberyn agreed, “All of the Fat Flower’s battles are won by Randyll Tarly.” 

“Then he is the man we should court.” 

“We will strip Tywin Lannister of all he holds dear before we kill him,” Doran promised. 

Elia clinked her glass with her brothers’. _The mean to cow us,_ she thought _but they forget our words._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ashara said “you thought you saw the last of me huh?” Lmao. I couldn’t make her Septa Lemore but wouldn’t it be a scorcher if Arianne’s ruse to crown Myrcella in the books was thwarted by Tyene whose mother Septa Lemore was all in for fAegon? Obviously in this story our boy is the real deal, but if I couldn’t make Ashara a septa, I wanted to make Lemore someone familiar. Also of course a septa that comfortable around sellswords would totally have a baby with Oberyn. 
> 
> In canon, Jon Arryn went to Dorne after Robert was crowned to appease them after Elia and her children. He returned Prince Lewyn Martell’s bones at the same time. I wanted to imagine how that conversation might have gone with Elia alive. Thanks to Cara Anam for suggesting Robert would marry her to someone to keep Dornish loyal. That is so on brand for Westeros.
> 
> I don’t know what colour Meraxes truly was. I’ve read that it had grey scales & the Tolands have a green dragon on their banner. The dragon eating its tail refers to Rhaenys who flew around looking for the Dornish lords who left their castles and hid in the deserts waiting to strike. So I went with assuming it was green


	9. Eddard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I planned to write a 3 POV chapter but I have a busy week at work and this is all I managed to write.

**Eddard - 289 AC**

Ned’s silent promise never to leave the North again lasted all of six years. Six somewhat peaceful years surrounded by his growing family. Though not a day passed where he did not mourn all those who he had lost: Mother, Father, Brandon, Lyanna, even Benjen up there on the Wall. It had been years since he saw his brother. And of course there was her. He missed her still but what was once a gaping wound, where his hatred of himself festered, was now like a lost limb. The pain of the wound was gone but the loss and its occasional ache in the cold was there all the same. Just as a man who’d lost an arm could sometimes forget but never escape his loss, Ned Stark would never be able to escape the appearance of The Sword of the Morning in the night sky. He’d have some respite whenever it snowed or it was cloudy but that did not mean it was not there, staring down accusingly at him. 

That is not to say that he hadn’t gained a semblance of peace and happiness in the intervening years, even if that happiness felt undeserved. He had five children now. Winterfell, which had been deprived of mirth for so long after Robert’s Rebellion - it couldn’t be _The Rebellion_ anymore for they had to distinguish _that_ one from _this_ one - was now filled with the laughter and squabbles of children. There was Jon, who grew up from a quiet babe into a quiet, solemn boy who shared his laughter sparingly unlike Robb whose smiles came easily. Sansa, his eldest daughter, was a delight and as proper a lady as they came, even at four. She was even more different from her sister as Robb was from Jon. Ned’s greatest weakness was his youngest daughter, Arya. “Half a boy, half a wolf-pup,” Cat called her and Ned could not think of any other description befitting of her. She trailed after her brothers like a shadow. She’d tie a stick to her body where they wore wooden swords and refuse to leave the yard. She never stopped asking questions about any and everything for she had to learn why everything was the way it was. And if an answer didn’t please her it was _stupid._ Even at three she had a bossiness about her that had older children doing her bidding. More than once he’d seen her and a gang of hers hunting for flowers and insects. No day passed where she was not mud spluttered and filthy. She reminded him so much of Lyanna at the same age. Ned had left for the Eyrie when she was just four. Arya looked like her, spoke like her and acted like her. She even loved the same flowers as her and every time she picked a new bunch for him, Ned tried his best not to cry. _Lyanna had once picked those same flowers for father once._ Every time he saw her, especially when she was with Jon whose side she seldom left, he saw the sister he’d failed and the trust she left behind. He would never fail her, Jon or any of his children. 

And as surely as Benjen followed Lyanna, one year old Bran stumbled on unsteady legs after Arya...when he was not clambering up chairs and tables in the Great Hall. 

He had grown to love his wife as well, and he believed that over the years she too had come to appreciate him even if he were not the man she had wanted initially. 

The raven came in the night a month ago. Balon Greyjoy declared himself the first Iron King since Harren Hoare was burnt alive in his castle. His father Quellon Greyjoy had once risen for Robert, in the hopes of making peace with the rest of the kingdoms. He had died in the Battle of the Mander. After him, for six years his son, the Lord of the Iron Islands, had stayed quiet, building what he hoped would be an unrivalled fleet. Robert was still called a usurper, even now so Balon’s hope was that the Great Houses would allow this rebellion to take hold in the same way Robert’s once had. So Balon struck Lannisport. The first fires had taken Lord Tywin’s flagship. Having burnt the Lannister fleet at anchor, in one night, he gained control of the Sunset Sea. His men striked Seagard shortly thereafter and Lord Jason Mallister, in protecting his coast, deprived Balon of his heir. 

What Balon had not known, however, was that Robert lived for three things: women, wine and war. Robert, Ned sensed, was relieved and bursting for more of what he loved best. Balon Greyjoy would rue that to his own regret. The banners were called and Ned found himself marching south once more. For the second time in their marriage, Cat had waved him off to war. This time more lovingly and with more at stake. When he rode off the last time, they had not known she was with child. Now, they had four children who would expect their father back. There was a fear in her too, of his death but also that he would bring back another bastard into their home. 

“The last time you rode off to war, my lord, you brought back a bastard. Please do not shame me so again,” she had said to him before he left, “for I cannot bear it now after so many years of marriage.”

Jon was still a sore point in their marriage. She had never quite warmed to him no matter how much he tried. The boy was easy to love. Of all the children in their home, it was Arya who had the wolf blood. Jon could sit in a room and were you not to see him yourself, you’d never know he was there. Sometimes the melancholy in the boy made Ned feel a failure. Lyanna had been so full of life and had once yelled down the corridors of the Great Keep as sure as his daughter did now. Perhaps if Jon had done that, Ned would feel as if he preserved a little of Lyanna in her boy. Instead, he felt as if he allowed even that to be snuffed out. It seemed that by now Jon had learnt what it meant to be a bastard. 

Princess Elia Martell moving to the North had done little to make Cat love the boy. The princess doted on all Ned’s children but Jon most of all. She’d play at dances with Sansa, tell stories to Arya, bring gifts of wooden swords and toys to all the boys but she doted on Jon in a way that caught Catelyn’s eye - though she’d never say anything outright to Ned. She’d only ask for Jon to be sent away to somewhere he would be cared for. She had shouted and pleaded and pointed out the names of lords that had their bastards fostered out but his answer was always the same. No. He would not fail his sister in death after failing her in life. _The lone wolf dies._ For as long as he could, Ned would ensure his family stayed together. _We are stronger together._

Elia too had asked to foster Jon, as did her brother, Oberyn, who came North once a year every year and exasperated Catelyn every time he had. Every year he’d bring a different one of his bastard daughters up north to keep his sister company. “Bastards are not despised in Dorne,” he said once. “Give the boy a chance to know something other than cold indifference.”

“He lacks for nothing,” Ned had protested, annoyed that Catelyn’s coldness to the boy had been noticed even by a stranger. Oberyn, Ned had learnt, never had any qualms in letting his feelings known. He had no doubt Elia had noticed Cat’s coldness too but never had she said anything to Ned. He’d only notice her hug him longer, and shower him with attention whenever she visited. That only made Cat more convinced Jon was Ashara’s son. _How different,_ he’d think sometimes, _two women react to the child fathered on another woman by their husband._

Elia had married Ethan Glover six years past. Robert, he heard, had sought to marry her to his brother. Elia suggested a northern match for herself instead, saying that she could not give Stannis children and that the only person she and Robert would trust was him. When she had arrived along with both her brothers, every unmarried lord in the North arrived with his own proposal - relishing the opportunity to marry a former queen-to-be, and a princess in her own right. 

First came Wyman Manderly. “I have two heirs of my own,” he had declared, “I only need a companion to share my latter years with.” While the Manderlys had been in the North for nearly a thousand years, they were the most southron of the northmen and the wealthiest among them. Ned had heard Oberyn tell his sister she’d be flattened beneath the man as she slept if he rolled over in bed. 

Next came Roose Bolton who’d lost his wife Bethany six years previously and was yet unmarried. The Dreadfort was the warmest of the northern castles after Winterfell and would have been a suitable home for a southron princess during winter. “No,” Doran said without explanation. 

Lord Rickard Karstark followed. With three heirs of his own, he cared little and less for children with the princess. 

She met each one kindly. Ned himself had summoned Ethan Glover asking why he had not made a proposal of his own. Both his brothers were married, he had never cared for children of his own and had been half in love with the princess by the time they left Dorne. When Ned invited him to Winterfell, he merely said he had nothing to offer a princess. “Deepwood Motte is a wooden hall atop a hill,” he said. “I have neither the wealth nor an old enough name.” The princess’ reply was she cared nought for either. She did not know the lords who had proposed but Ethan had seen the horrors she had. “We can heal each other,” she said. 

Red faced and tongue-tied Ethan had spluttered about how the north was called in winter. “I suppose you’ll have to keep me warm then,” Elia laughed. 

Ned watched their union with amusement. A Dornish woman and a northern man had finally managed to find some happiness with one another. He hoped their happiness would last. He had killed his own slice of it long ago. 

The princess’ marriage was a boon to the north. Her family’s ties had connected them in trade with the Norvoshi and Volantenes. Deepwood Motte had gone from a wooden hut on a hill to a stone structure on a hill, though the building still continued. Ethan had sent her to Winterfell for the duration of the war for Deepwood Motte was along the coastline of the Sunset Sea. She came frequently enough as it was. Whenever she was sick, the hot pools did her well. 

Robert had met them with his Southern host at Seagard. The news came recently. Stannis had defeated the Iron Fleet at Sea. Their longships, made for lightning strikes and raiding, were no match for the Royal Fleet’s war galleys. Patience, at least in battle, was not something Stannis Baratheon lacked. Where Robert was all fire, sometimes, Ned thought, Stannis was a man of ice. He waited for the Iron Fleet to attack, guiding them to the straits of Fair Isle before the rest of his fleet circumnavigated and took the Iron Fleet from both north and south. Now, all that remained was to sail their troops and siege weapons to the Iron Isles to crush the rebellion entirely, though Balon Greyjoy had already been defeated. Their strength had always been in their ships and the Iron Fleet was broken. 

It had been years since Ned had seen Robert, he had not known what to expect but all anyone in their host spoke of was the reunion of Ned Stark and Robert Baratheon. That, he heard, had given many men a belief in victory. The two of them, they said, had overthrown a king. 

“Ned!” Robert hollered loudly, arms outstretched for a hug! “It is good to see your dour face!” He carried his spiked war hammer as if it were as light as a practice sword. 

“You stink of horse,” Ned laughed.

“Is that the way you greet your king?” 

“I believe it is my duty to speak the truth to him when prompted,” Ned laughed once more. Jon Arryn had done his part in trying to mend the gap between them in the years past. First came ravens of Robert’s regret about the death of Lyanna, and with that came the stories of traders and visitors all speaking of a king still in mourning. He was the only other person bar he and Ben who had loved her and missed her still. Then came the gifts at the birth of each child. Ned did not doubt they were gifts from Jon Arryn but they came in the name of the king. 

Robert was in the company of his Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, Ser Barristan Selmy. The last time Ned had seen him was at The Trident when the royal host had been defeated. He was brought to them grievously wounded and near death. Roose Bolton urged them to cut his throat, but Robert, the brother Ned chose, declared, “I will not kill a man for loyalty, nor for fighting well.” He had sent his own maester to tend Ser Barristan’s wounds. That was the Robert Ned had loved. And it was not rare for him to act with such magnanimity. It was why such a large host had travelled north with him despite fighting against him just years previously. He had a way of winning men over. During the rebellion he had won three battles in a single day defeating Lords Grandison, Cafferen and Fell. He slew Lord Fell in single combat and that very same night, with the men he defeated, drank in merriment under their fallen banners. Lords Grandison and Cafferen and Lord Fell’s heir, Silveraxe, had all marched north with him now. 

Their host split in different directions. Ser Barristan was to lead the attack on Old Wyk, Stannis was to mount his assault of Great Wyk while others were given command of the assaults upon Orkmont and Harlaw. Command of the greatest of their isles was Ned and Robert’s. Robert had saved the Greyjoys for them. Their journey had reminded Ned of the brother he loved and he found himself loving him once more. 

“What have you and Jon done to me Ned?” he asked one night as they sailed. “I wanted no crown. _This, this_ I know. _This_ I love.” He raised his war hammer as if it were the lightest thing.

“The people wanted a Targaryen king,Your Grace.” Ned reminded him, “Your grandmother-“

“Bugger the Targaryens!” he bellowed. “I care for no throne. Sometimes I dream of giving it up, taking my hammer and going on the road, a hedge knight or a sellsword. I don’t know whether to thank Balon Greyjoy for this or to take his head. He’s brought me back some excitement.” He cupped a hand by his ear. “The song of war, Ned, I love that sound,” he said of the drumming behind them. 

“I don’t think you should say that out loud, Robert. We are here fighting against a threat to your very throne.”

“Are you? I’m just here for the fighting. Hah! They bore me to death in that snake’s nest down south, Ned. They want me to count coppers and rule from that ugly throne. Stannis wants to shut every brothel in the city and outlaw gambling. Renly on the other hand is entirely Mace Tyrell’s creature. Stannis wants to turn a flower into a man. A joyless one but a man nonetheless. You can imagine how I’m stuck between them. Two brothers, neither of whom have much love for me. Stannis blames me for not punishing the Tyrells for what they did to Storm’s End but I cannot punish one person and forgive another for their loyalty to the crown. Jon advised me to do the smart thing. ‘Marry Stannis to a Florent,’ he said, ‘and it’ll remind the Tyrells that on the first hint of treason you’ll give Highgarden to their rivals.‘ Stannis cares nought for that, of course. And Renly, I don’t know what to do with him. He’s at loggerheads with the golden shit that is my wife.”His smile faded slowly. He took a long swig and handed the wineskin to Ned. “All I wanted was my Lyanna back, Ned. I would have killed him all the same but I had no need for a throne. I barely ruled Storm’s End myself.”

“Me too,” Ned said longingly. He went to war to get his sister back and to protect all those he loved. 

“How did she die?”

“Of a fever.”

“I kill him, Ned. Every night I smash my hammer against his chest, removing it in its entirety for what he did to her...and it is never enough. I caved in his chest and snuffed out his life. Even then, Ned, he mocked me. _Lyanna,_ he sighed as he died. Would that I could kill him a thousand times more for taking her name into his mouth. They call the place the Ruby Ford now. They name me king, Demon of the Trident, the fiercest warrior in the realm, and every bit of it is a hollow victory. He is with her and I have Cersei fucking Lannister.”

“Well,” Ned sighed, trying to console him, “she is said to be the most beautiful woman in the world.” Even before the rebellion they called her the Light of the West. 

“What is the point of that if you fuck her once a year? She acts as if all the gold in Casterly Rock is hidden up her cunt. The Greyjoys would have more luck striking there than her father’s town”

“Well, your heir-”

“Before I left, the boy cut open a pregnant cat’s belly to see if she really did have kittens in there. He laid them at my feet.” 

Ned was not sure what to say to that. He thought of his daughters, both as different as the sun and moon, yet joined in their love of animals. He could not imagine his sons doing anything as dreadful either. 

“I clapped him so hard, Stannis thought I killed him.” 

_Would that you had done that to Tywin Lannister who too once laid dead babes at your feet,_ Ned thought. The Old Lion of the Rock too had travelled with them. He was to command one of the assaults himself. 

“He is a child,” he offered instead, “I am sure he was merely curious.”

“You have been luckier than me, I take it,” said Robert, “four children in six years. You must be fucking for warmth in Winterfell hah! And a bastard? Who’d you spill him into then?” 

“I’d rather not talk about it.” 

“Come on,” he roared, snatching the wineskin back, “tell me!” 

Before long, they were laughing like they once had as two boys stealing a wineskin from the kitchens at The Eyrie in the middle of the night. 

When they landed ashore, Robert made his way to the battlefield clad in his antlered helm, flinging his spiked warhammer, a giant amongst men. Ned saw the Demon of the Trident. Side by side, they were brothers-in-arms once more.

First came the destruction of Botley Castle and it’s attached town Lordsport before they proceeded to lay siege to Balon Greyjoy’s castle. With the destruction of their strength at sea, the iron born were sitting ducks. They had no warriors comparable to the host Robert had gathered. Men of the Westerlands, The Reach, North, Riverlands, Stormlands, Vale and Crownlands had all gathered here. All but the Dornish who said they had no ships for such an endeavour, though Ned knew they were yet to forgive the deaths of Prince Aegon and Princess Rhaenys. Robert had risen for the assault upon his good father, the same man the Dornish held responsible for the deaths of the children. 

They launched their assault against the southern wall with siege engines, shattering the main watchtower and its surrounding walls. Many were crushed beneath those walls, including Balon Greyjoy’s second son. The first through the breach was a drunk red priest sent by the followers of an eastern religion. Thoros of Myr was sent to convert Robert but from everything Ned had seen, it was Robert who converted him. With a flaming sword coated in wildfire he madly forced through slashing and killing all those he came across with murderous efficiency. Right behind him was Lord Jorah Mormont, Lord of Bear Island. Robert raised his helm, kissed his war hammer, promised it that he would feed it soon and began swinging. Ned too joined the fight. Shields clashed and all around him the battle raged: blood and shit and guts spilled in mud. Robert reached the top of a ladder and cleared them a space by swinging his war hammer so wildly that he nearly took Ned’s head along with it. They stepped over dead and dying men and drove forward, ramming their weapons. Robert sang the song of his hammer. 

Ned had never fought with Ice in battle, though he had brought it with him. His sword was lodged into a shield, he snatched a fallen axe, a clumsy weapon if he had ever seen any. He faced a man he later learned was Euron Greyjoy in battle. The man had a mocking smile on his face though his people were all but defeated. 

Most men spoke of battle fury, Ned Stark had only known battle calm. He had never taken pleasure in killing, it was not the way of his father or Jon Arryn. But battle calm to him was when all nerves took flight. Nothing existed but he and his opponent. He lunged forward and swept his shield left, smashing in the man’s face. He felt the impact run up his arm before he threw the axe and removed his short sword, twisting it, ripping up and free and sawed through skin and muscles and guts. It was not long before he felt warm blood on his cold hands. Even as he struck the sword in, the man smiled a dastardly red smile. “What is dead may never die,” he mocked, “but rises again harder and stronger.” Ned could smell the ale breath on his face. Euron Greyjoy moved backwards, pulling the sword from his gut with each step, using his long sword to stand. He began moving towards Ned once more and took a sword to the throat. Then came more axes and swords and hammers. All around them the ironborns castle was aflame and awash with dead bodies. At the harbour, their ships were burning and the smoke and flames blinded and choked them. Through the fog, Ned saw the falling banners of the kraken. Not long after, Balon Greyjoy was brought to them in chains. The ironborn threw down their weapons then, seeing the complete defeat. Their castle was destroyed, their fleet subdued and their so-called king in chains. Robert dropped his hammer and walked toward Ned, throwing his arms around him in an embrace. Men cheered and spoke of the two of them winning another war. 

But it was Robert’s next act that reminded Ned of the man Robert was. Where Stannis called for all the Greyjoys to be put to the sword, “Kill them all, root and stem,” he advocated. Robert refused. Instead, he called for Balon Greyjoy to bend the knee. 

“You may take my head,” he spat, “but you cannot name me traitor. No Greyjoy ever swore fealty to a Baratheon.” 

Robert raised his hammer, the next blow would kill Balon Greyjoy in a single swing Ned knew, but he paused. “Swear one now,” he warned, “or lose that stubborn head of yours.” 

The man who’d declared himself the first Iron King in three centuries had bent the knee just like every other lord in the realm. Dragons had once achieved that but Robert’s fury they said had achieved the same once more. Balon Greyjoy’s rebellion had done more for Robert’s hold on the throne than Robert’s own rebellion once had. The Demon of the Trident had won two wars. This time had brought his realms together and he had done it without exceeding the limits of what was honourable in war. 

Some had asked for Balon’s last living heir to be killed or sent to the Wall as punishment for his father’s rebellion. Remembering what had once been done to the Targaryen children, Ned had volunteered to take the boy as a ward. The frightened child had done no wrong. He was only a little older than Robb and Jon. 

“Rebel once more,” Robert growled at Balon Greyjoy, “And I’ll have his head taken clean off.” 

To celebrate his victory, Robert announced a great tourney at Lannisport. Before they even left Pyke he knighted a great many men, celebrating bravery wherever he found it. He even drank with Balon Greyjoy himself laughing about how stupid the man was. “Gah!” he clapped him on the back. “You gave me back what I love!” 

Ned looked down at his new ward. He hoped to raise him to be better than his father. Perhaps he could do for him what he had failed to do for Rhaenys and Aegon Targaryen. 

As they sailed down to Lannisport, he turned his eyes skyward once more. He would never wash away his guilt but perhaps he could do good before he was sent to Catelyn’s seven hells.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like all characters in ASOIAF, Ned has a blind spot. His, is named Robert Baratheon. He will find whatever excuse he can for the guy, even if it’s blaming Tywin for the murders of the babies because to accept his friend is a monster is too difficult a thought to face.  
> I wanted to inhabit Ned’s mind while I wrote this to try and understand what he loved about the guy. We met Robert at his worst during the first chapter. I wanted to show him in a somewhat better light because Ned Stark clearly held a place in his heart for him, even after their falling out when Egg & Rhaenys were killed in canon. I wanted to explore the man Ned took for a brother and the best time to do that was the Greyjoy Rebellion - the first time they meet up again (or so it seems). I wonder how different Robert’s life might have been if he didn’t watch his parents die :( - I mean it probably wouldn’t be much different but just imagine.  
> He was a terrible king and a subpar man but I think one quality he had was winning people over (except if your name was Lyanna Stark). It takes a different kind of man to fight someone in a war and then drink with them as buddies shortly after. I think that’s what Ned loved about him - he wasn’t an outright monster.  
> Side note; you have no idea how much it makes me laugh that the first mention of Roose Bolton in the books is him advocating for the death of Ser Barristan Selmy when Robert forgave him.  
> I killed Euron because no one has the time for that level of crazy - also he’s such a fake brave man. Attacking Lannisport was his idea but he was too cowardly to lead the fighting himself. His whole folly in The Reach is the same thing - he knows they can’t hold the lands so he’s only putting his rivals there to have the people turn against them. Sans the dragons he’s a little loser without a moral compass (but don’t tell him I said that).  
> Funny story, but not really, in an early, early draft of this story I considered killing Ned here :( I had no idea he’d be this central to the story.


	10. Elia

**Elia - 289 AC**

In Dorne, even in the coldest winter, all Elia had to do was wrap a thin scarf around her body. In King’s Landing, she’d wear a cloak. Here, snow smothered any hope of warmth. It lay a thin white sheet over what Elia knew to be summer and put it to sleep. Even now, walking through the halls of Winterfell’s Great Keep, she was clad head to toe in layers of thick furs and seal skin. Throughout the spring she fell ill so often that she wondered whether she should have accepted Jon Arryn’s proposal to marry her to Stannis Baratheon. Dragonstone had once been her home and at least there was warmth to be had in the south. She married her man during the spring thaw and fell ill shortly after. For a year she had been abed, saved only by the hot springs and walls of Winterfell. 

The sun of Dorne came north six years past. Suitors had flowed into Winterfell’s walls for weeks on end. She’d met the jovial Lord Manderly whose wealth Doran thought would be a welcome support for Aegon’s cause. Elia herself would have considered it, were Oberyn not to point out the lord’s girth every time he saw him. “He is older than our father and like to die before Egg comes to claim his throne,” he pointed out. “And that’s presuming _you_ live to see your son’s return...Lord-too-fat-to-sit-a-horse may accidentally see to your end in bed one night when he rolls over.” Just like with Baelor Breakwind before him, Elia’s rational mind fled in the face of Oberyn’s silly japes. 

Next came Roose Bolton who neither one of her brothers warmed to. The man’s face held no warmth. His stale, hard eyes watched her like a predator watched it’s prey, always looking for a weakness he could exploit. His calculating eyes reminded her of the person she hated the most in the world, the Old Lion of the Rock. It didn’t help that his banners boasted a flayed man and that his castle was called The _Dread_ fort. Old Nan’s stories about the Boltons wearing the skins of their enemies had been the proverbial nail in the coffin where he was concerned - the man looked half-dead anyway. 

As every suitor came with their suits, Elia kept her eye out for Ethan Glover, her companion for the worst three moons of her life. Every day she’d arise with new hope that he may arrive to make his proposal but every night she’d sleep with disappointment. She knew Deepwood Motte held none of the riches of White Harbor, and that House Glover did not have the strength in men that the Dreadfort and Karhold could boast. But in the long game that Elia had found herself entering, she felt that there were only five men in the north she could trust with her life: the five men who saved it. Among them, Ethan Glover was the only one who was yet to wed. He was the only one she could trust herself with. So when he came with his doubts she tried to lay each one to rest. 

Though the gaping hole in her heart could never be filled, her son was half a world away and her daughter dead, Elia had learned to make the most of the prison Robert Baratheon had intended for her. She found beauty and even belonging in the north. 

The north was so different from Dorne, in its weather, in their people’s attitudes,in their food! Yet she found glimpses of home here too. In Bear Island, the lord’s aunt, Lady Maege Mormont claimed her children were fathered by bears. No one had asked her for any more information or derided them as bastards. They were Mormonts and everyone had accepted them as that. Her daughters, the She-bears became fast friends with Oberyn’s Sand Snakes, making the years Obara and Nym had spent in the north so much more enjoyable for them. The eldest of the She-bears carried a Morningstar while her nieces preferred a whip and a dagger each. Their friendship had gone some way in endearing the people of Bear Island to her...and Oberyn had done the rest. 

Throughout the Seven Kingdoms the Dornish were held with some derision. So were the northerners who were dismissed as tree-worshipping brutes. Elia had once thought the same. When she first arrived, the northerners weren’t sure how to be around her. She was the wife of the man who had kidnapped, and as the story went, raped the daughter of their liege. At The Trident they fought against him and against the host of Dornishmen led by her uncle Lewyn. Yet over time, their opinions of her changed when she stuck out year after year in the north, creating ties between them and the Free Cities with whom they had no strong trade links with. She was sure having Oberyn for a brother helped somewhat too. Wherever men were found, it seemed, they shared a love of drink, or war or women...often all three. And her brother could outdrink, outfight and, yes, outfuck most men. Theo Wull had once taken him up the mountains to his clan’s holdfast. By the time he returned to her every single one of the mountain clans had insisted on hosting him as he regaled them with his tales of travel across the world. They loved him at White Harbor too. It was the port through which he came up north each time. While there, he brokered a relationship between the city and men of influence among the Braavosi merchant class. 

She had made her own friendships too. Old Nan had been the one to teach her so much of the north’s history and its people. Winterfell’s maester had also been helpful but none in Winterfell had been as helpful as Catelyn Stark. 

“I know how hard it can be here,” she told Elia when she first arrived, “this place is so different from home but I have grown to love it. I hope you do too and if there’s anything I can do to help, please call upon me.” They often shared tales of their childhoods and what they missed of the south although they still had differences too, the biggest of which was their attitudes to the smallfolk and about bastards. Elia had grown up playing in the pools of the Water Gardens among the children of the smallfolk and her brother had five bastard daughters of his own. For Catelyn Stark, the presence of her husband’s bastard in their home had coloured her attitudes to all bastards, Oberyn’s daughters included. Though for the ever courteous Lady of Winterfell, her disapproval was never obvious. It was always hidden in the way she pressed her lips together and in her strained smiles. Elia had spent long enough at court to know when courtesies were feigned and everyone of Catelyn’s was when Oberyn came north with his daughters or his squire, Ser Ryon Allyrion’s natural son, Daemon. It did not help that her brother had always subtly riled her up once he identified her dislike for bastards. Once Lady Catelyn asked why he wouldn’t marry so he could have trueborn children, blessed by the Father and Mother. 

“Trueborn children are born of duty, my lady,” he crooned, “bastards are children of passion. My brother is the Ruling Prince. Even if my children were trueborn they would inherit nothing but the dust of Sunspear. Let duty be my brother’s domain...and passion mine.” 

While many had helped her begin to love this new land, she found true belonging in the north with her husband. He was as different from Rhaegar as night was from day. Where Rhaegar had been clean shaven and light of hair, her husband boasted a thick beard. Where Rhaegar was lean, Ethan was broad and muscled. He was so much bigger than her that some days she felt like a child beside him, especially when he’d pick her up and carry her around their keep as if she were unable to walk herself. He had made her feel safe, and more importantly, truly loved. Elia had learned love from her parents, she’d seen it in Mellario and her brother, and lately, Oberyn and Ellaria but she had never known it for herself. In the early days Rhaegar was kind enough, even towards the end he still retained that but she had never felt that she was the true object of his desires...that he had truly loved her. Ethan made her feel things she was never sure could be her lot in life. Yes, Deepwood Motte was more a holdfast than a grand castle, and it’s people poor and cold and harsh but she had found love and appreciation there with Ethan and his family. His brothers Robett and Galbart had accepted her with open arms, never once mentioning that they had fought at The Trident against Rhaegar and her kin. Their wives taught her about the ways of the north and her husband hunted the furs she wore himself. He’d taught her to fish and work with her hands and whenever she felt ill he looked after her himself. 

Rhaegar used to treat her illness as an inconvenience that prevented him from having the three heads of his dragon. Had the maester not told him that she could not survive another child, she did not doubt he would force her to carry one more despite the knowledge of how the previous two had nearly killed her. Ethan had never complained whenever she fell prey to her own frailty and had never mentioned children to her after the day they married. It was he who told her that his brothers were his heirs when she brought the subject up. Once, he’d even taken her back to Dorne where the sun had cured her ailments. They’d agreed she’d never spend a winter in the north for she could not survive it. Said winter was yet to come...though to hear the Starks tell it, it was always coming. 

She heard tales of how in King’s Landing they laughed at how far she seemingly fell out of favour. Apparently the new queen had found Elia’s circumstances delightful, a recompense for taking Rhaegar from her. 

Elia herself felt like Oberyn, a viper hidden in long grass. She had all but faded into obscurity where those in court were concerned. She had begun building her son the fleet with which he would begin his journey to take back his birthright. The Chief Magister of Norvos, Doran’s good-father, had travelled north to offer the opening of trade links between the north and Norvos. Nestled between Pentos, Qohor and Lorath, Norvos seldom traded with the Seven Kingdoms. In this land where a wintry sun introduced spring with a wane warmth that the people celebrated with gratitude, the trade with the Free Cities had brought much needed coin into the lands of Ned Stark. Sometimes, she tried to think that the coin they made from the trade would feed more people in the coming winter such that the men of the mountains would not have to leave their homes to ‘hunt’ just to save provisions for their families. It was the only way she could ease the knot of guilt that twisted in her gut whenever she thought of the war that would one day come to Westeros upon her son’s return. At times, she thought she was helping to save lives that would be lost anyway when Aegon returned to claim the throne of his ancestor from his usurper. 

For years she wondered whose side Ned Stark and her husband would take the day Egg returned to Westeros. She always knew the truth of the matter but it hadn’t stopped her hoping the answer would be different. Once, Lord Stark’s son, Robb, had come running to her, “Princess Elia,” he shouted, struggling to catch his breath after running across the yard to her. He was accompanied by Jon. “Mother says you knew Ser Arthur Dayne!” He was wide-eyed. “Can you tell us about him?”” 

“Father says he was the best swordsman he ever met,” Jon beamed beside him, “...and he was your friend!” Elia remembered smiling at the tiny boys, Lyanna’s one especially. Arthur was his father’s sworn man and had protected him at his birth.

Though they asked her to tell them about the Kingsguard, they led the conversation telling her everything they knew of each knight. Ser Barristan, even here, was _The Bold._

“Ser Oswell Whent was related to my mother’s mother,” Robb boasted proudly. 

On and on they went naming as many Kingsguard as they could, including Ser Ryam Redwyne and the brothers Arryk and Eryk until they came to Jaime Lannister.

“Father says he shouldn’t count,” Robb said vociferously when Jon named him. “He _killed_ the old king when he swore to protect him. He shouldn’t count.” That had told her that Ned Stark had taught his children of the cracks in Robert’s rule. 

But that did not mean that he would not rise for his friend. She got her answer for a surety when Balon Greyjoy lay waste to the Lannister fleet. Northern banners marched south behind the king that had usurped her son to avenge the losses of the man who had ordered his death. Split loyalties battled in her heart. She wanted to see Robert and Tywin debased - the latter for ordering the deaths of her children and the former for approving his actions - but she wanted her husband and his men to return home safe. 

More than once she considered telling Ethan about Egg. Her son could live with them and be hidden here like his brother. It had been six years since she last held her boy but knowing he was alive had kept hope of a reunion in her heart. Once, desperate for her only child she told Oberyn that she would be pleased with just the death of Tywin Lannister. 

“Kill him brother,” she pleaded, “and I will swear to Lord Stark that my son will never claim that throne. He will allow him to live here with me, I know it.” That was a year ago when they found Viserys being looked after by Ser Willem Darry in Braavos. The boy, she learned, had spent years believing he was the rightful king. Learning the Iron Throne truly belonged to his younger nephew had enraged him so much so that he had tried to drown Egg in a pool. Had her brother’s face not been so grave, she might have believed they were just children playing. She heard Ashara and his father’s friends had not let Egg out of their sight since the incident but even that had done little to cool her heart. She cried against her brother’s chest begging for a chance to be reunited with her son. 

“Elia...” he sighed, relenting in his rage when she sobbed, the pain crippling her. “Giving up now will mean letting Tywin Lannister win.” Whenever she tried to steel herself, she remembered the steel in her brother's voice that day. They sat on the floor in the guest quarters assigned to Oberyn at Deepwood Motte, holding hands just as they had when they were children comforting one another. “Egg will be hidden away freezing and without prospects in your husband’s decrepit keep, while his throne will be occupied by the grandson of the man who ordered him killed. Is that what you want for him? Robert and Tywin want to build their legacy on the bones of your children. You _cannot_ let them get away with that!” In truth, even that did little to ease the vice that gripped her heart. 

_“_ I want my son, Oberyn,” she wept. “I want him by my side. I want him to know me. I want him to love me...how can he love me if I write to him once a year?” More than once she considered running away with her brother to her son. He knew where he was and she did not. She knew it would break her heart and Ethan’s but a mother’s madness knew no bounds. Oberyn would talk her out of it every time. 

“Egg loves you,” he said comforting her. A teary whimper escaped her lips. Egg was too small for speech when she last saw him but Rhaenys always used to mumble, “Love you,” smack clumsy kisses in her chubby hands and throw them out. Elia had lived for those moments. 

“He’s a smart boy and Ashara tells him stories of you...of all of us when we were children. I tell him the same whenever I visit. He knows why you cannot be together.”

“He’s six,” she remembered crying.

“He lives in hiding, knowing that his father’s killer would have him killed were he to know he was still alive. He’s had to grow up faster than other children.” 

“That is too heavy a burden for a boy to bear. I want him to know happiness and joy and a mother’s love.”

“He is a king,” Oberyn said, his voice iron, “His duty is to avenge his sister and his mother. Hiding the truth from him will not serve him.” 

Every year she wrote as many letters as she could while hidden away with her brother, for she was scared her letters would be found if she wrote them before his arrival. She tried to tell her son how much she loved him, how much she wished she could be with him. She told him happy stories of his sister and of his father. Every child idolised their father and Rhaegar for all his faults was not as bad a man as they made him seem these days. He was not the vile rapist they named him when Robert took his throne. She sewed her son blankets, and tunics and socks - she heard the hills of Norvos could be cold. But that did little to lessen the yearning in her heart. His absence was a wound that had never healed. She missed out on his first words, and his first steps. She did not know his favourite foods. She heard he called Ashara mother and that he’d learnt to speak Norvoshi, High Valyrian and the Common Tongue. She had not been there to see any of it. She learned that he progressed in his training with weapons. It was no surprise for he had the greatest swordsmen alive as his teachers but she wanted to see all that for herself. 

Last year, Oberyn had written down his words to her in a letter he brought. Reading her son’s words felt like finding an oasis after an age in the desert. Burning that letter had broken her heart. Her boy spoke of loving her and missing her and of the sure knowledge that they would see each other again. She had cried tears of happiness for the first time in years. 

Sometimes, as she lay in bed next to her husband she felt as if she was living a lie for she could not share her happiness and her hurt with him. 

In that sense, she was not too much unlike Ned Stark. Elia learned from her visit to Winterfell that Catelyn Stark had not known that Jon was Rhaegar’s. Elia’s heart broke for Lyanna Stark’s boy whenever she saw him. She thought of the girl’s last moments and her fear for her boy. He was safe and the children all seemed to love him but Elia did not fail to notice how Catelyn Stark doted on her own children and failed to extend that warmth to the child who’d always sit in a corner of the room by himself playing with wooden figures of the Young Dragon and Ser Aemon the Dragonknight. Whenever she saw that she thought of her son. She hoped the two of them would one day have true love between them. 

As much as she despised Catelyn Stark’s coldness to the boy, she was only a guest in Winterfell and Catelyn was the wife of the Warden of the North. It was not her place to say anything. She tried to make up for it by bringing him gifts and telling him stories. Her son had both Ashara and Lemore. Jon had no one. On his fourth name day, as she told him and Robb a story, he whispered, “I wish you were my mother.” She held her composure just until she turned the corner before she sunk to the floor, biting her lip to silence the sobs that ripped out of her chest. That night she asked to foster Jon herself. Oberyn had made his own offer on a later visit. Elia could understand Lord Stark’s refusal of Oberyn’s offer. Her brother was a good man, if a little licentious, but Dorne was a long way to send a little boy Lord Stark had sworn to protect. Deepwood Motte was not so far away however. 

“Aunt Elia!” The voice belonged to Sarella. “The sentries say father is coming!” Sarella threw the goldenheart longbow on the bed. Her niece had an insatiable curiosity that kept her busy locked away with Maester Luwin whenever he had a spare moment. Like all her sisters, her father had not left her without sufficient knowledge of how to protect herself. Her weapon of choice was the longbow gifted to her by her mother. 

“Prince Oberyn is coming!!!!” Arya Stark tumbled past her, ensuring that all could hear her. Oberyn’s daughters were living heroes to the younger Stark daughter and by extension so was the father who taught them what they knew. 

Sansa Stark, Lord Stark’s eldest daughter caught up with her. “You must be so pleased to see Prince Oberyn again, princess,” she offered as they walked. Elia had never met a more well-spoken four year old in her life. Where her nieces and even her daughter would once walk around with dirt on the hems of their dresses from playing with other children, Lady Catelyn’s girl spent more time inside with the new septa Lady Stark had taken into their service. As different as the two girls were, they shared a love of songs. Sansa would ask ‘ _Princess’_ Elia to tell her stories of gallant knights and princes and the princesses they saved. Arya too loved stories of knights but the younger Stark had a love of mischief. Visenya Targaryen was her personal hero. 

Catelyn Stark was already waiting at the yard with her son Robb. Jon, she realised, was hanging back waiting for Elia. In the distance, Elia saw the banners with the sun and spear billow in the end. Unusually however, this time her brother was riding with a small party of only five men. Usually, he arrived with at least one of his daughters and more men. As they got closer, she could see none of the girls in his company. At the front of Oberyn’s horse sat a child with blue hair. The moment he rode in through the castle gates her brother threw her a smile. Elia’s knees buckled when she realised who the child was. Martyn Cassell caught her. 

Oberyn vaulted off his horse, ceremoniously bending his knee to kiss the lady of the castle’s hand. Elia’s eyes never left the boy. _What are you doing Oberyn?_ A mother always knew her child. It had to be him after all Elia’s tears the last time her brother came north. The boy vaulted off the horse as if he were born upon it. Sarella turned to her with a confused look. 

“This is my son,” he announced, “Aegon Sand...after his cousin.”

“Why’s his hair blue?” asked Arya, moving forward to examine said hair closer.

“Arya,” Catelyn ground out, pulling her daughter closer to her. 

“His hair is blue! I like it.”

“My mother is from Essos, my lady,” the boy offered courteously. “In Tyrosh people dye their hair bright colours.”

She stared at him and then looked up at her mother. “Mother...I want blue hair!”

“You are welcome, as always, Prince Oberyn,” her mother said ignoring her, “to our hearth and home.” 

It was only then that her brother appeared before her, enveloping her in his arms. “I thought it was time you met your son,” he whispered. Elia held him tighter. _This is so dangerous,_ her head thought. _I’m so happy,_ her heart sang. 

“I am pleased to meet you, Princess Elia,” her son said. Elia’s heart could have flown out of her chest then. “I have heard so much about you.” A sound between a laugh and a cry escaped her. She pulled her boy into her arms. When the greetings were done, Elia volunteered to take Oberyn and his _son_ to their rooms. Sarella refused to leave their side, keen to meet this new brother of hers. 

“Why have we never met him before?” she asked her father. 

“I only just found him, Sarella. I found Obara when she was just a little smaller than him and she only lived in Old Town.”

“Will he come back to Sunspear with us?”

 _What are you doing, Oberyn?_ Elia found herself asking again. Seeing her furrowed brow, Oberyn only said, “Not yet.”

In the end it took much coaxing from her father before Sarella left them. 

“Have you lost your senses?” she snapped at her brother as Egg looked out of the window. “You have put my son’s life at risk. He’s a child. One wrong word and-“

“I promise I won’t tell mother,” her son said, suddenly in front of her. “I only wanted to see you. I promise I won’t say anything. I practiced all the way with Uncle Oberyn.” 

An involuntary whimper escaped her lips and before she knew it, she had fallen to her knees, pulling her baby against her chest, raining down kisses on every part of his face. “I am so happy to see you,” she cried. “So, so happy. Oh my Egg.”

He placed his small hands on her face, wiping her tears. It only made more fall. 

“I am so sorry,” she mumbled. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be with you”

“Ma Ashara says you’re doing it to protect me.”

“She is,” Oberyn confirmed. “She also has wanted to see you for so many years, so I’ll leave you together. If anyone asks you questions you remember our story.”

“I’ll only speak about Essos and to you and Mother in closed rooms with a guard outside,” he said. 

Elia chortled once more, looking at her brother with so much amazement, fear...and gratitude. For the first time in six years she held her baby. 

She spent the rest of the day locked away with her boy, holding him, kissing him. He told her about his lessons with a _halfmaester,_ who had not earned enough links for a chain. It sounded like something her brother would cook up. Her son was tutored by a maester who was not a maester and instructed by a septa who had a bastard. The thought made her chuckle. It was exactly the sort of thing she should have expected from Oberyn. 

“Mother,” he said hesitantly.

“Yes, sweetling?” If Elia could stay in this moment forever she would. 

“Viserys said everything that happened to us, happened because of the usurper and Lord Stark. He said that if it wasn’t for them, we would still be true princes. Why are you in his castle then?”

She moved away to look properly upon her son’s face. “What else has Viserys been saying?”

“He…” her son looked down at his hands. “He said some unkind things about you.” 

“What did he say about me?”

“He said you were no true princess and that Father would never have looked at Lyanna Stark if you were a good wife. Ser Arthur said he was wrong.”

When she had last seen Viserys Targaryen he was a delightful boy of eight, a year older than Egg was now. It seemed that the child Elia had played with in the Red Keep had turned into a young man as vile as his father. 

“Viserys doesn’t know what he is talking about.”

“So is Lord Stark _not_ to blame for what happened?”

“He is not. He saved my life, and he nearly saved your sister’s. Viserys doesn’t know any of this because his father had saved his life while you, me and Rhaenys nearly died.” She had to bite her tongue before she burdened her son with her grief. 

“But Lord Stark fought against Father.”

“He did, but things are not as simple as that Egg. One day, when you’re older you’ll learn the truth and a good king doesn’t act until he knows the whole story.” 

Aegon began wringing his hands again. “Viserys said that I can’t be king because I’m not a true dragon like him.”

Elia wanted nothing more than to wring the neck of The boy who began to sound like the Mad King reborn. Instead, she smiled for her son. 

“The next time Viserys says that,” she said, “tell him that _you_ are the Sun’s son and the son of the Last Dragon. The Iron Throne is yours by right and he cannot have what is not his.” There was more that she wanted to say but those were not words for the ears of a boy. 

“Do you know the words of House Martell?”

“Unbent, unbowed, unbroken.”

“Good, the next time Viserys says something unkind to you, remind him that the dragon bows before the sun, not the other way around.”

Later, “How did Ser Gerold allow your uncle to do this?” she asked her boy, stroking his hair. 

“He’s waiting for us at White Harbor,” he replied. 

“What?”

“They said they wouldn’t leave the ship until our return.”

Her brother had brought the three most renowned knights in Westeros _back_ to Westeros and then left them on a ship. She closed her eyes and tried to breathe. Oberyn was playing with fire and she would not stand to see her son burnt. 

As they walked towards the Great Hall for supper she linked her arm with her brother’s, holding her son’s hand in the other. “Oberyn, how could you bring _them_ back to Westeros?” she chided him, smiling as she did so. 

“I am only staying here for two days, I’ll be back in White Harbor in four, and we’ll leave before anyone is any the wiser. I thought you’d be thanking me,” he teased, tapping her hand.

“Thank you so much.” She was earnest in her gratitude, but the gnawing feeling in her gut would not abate. 

“The men with me, in case you haven’t noticed, are the same ones who helped them escape. They are Doran’s sworn men. No one will ever know Egg was here and no one will suspect a thing. Everyone by now knows the story of how his body was presented to Robert. _This_ boy, is my son.”

Supper was served in the Great Hall. They shared a long table with Lady Stark and her children. When visitors came, Catelyn Stark would often assign Jon a seat with the castle staff. Elia had insisted on him sitting with her on her first visit and ever since then he’d sat at the same table as them if his siblings were present.

And when Oberyn brought his daughters, there was nothing Catelyn Stark could say about them. They were the daughters of a Prince of Dorne _and_ they were her guests. And if bastards could sit at the table, there was little preventing the small boy from joining them. 

Oberyn had begun the supper handing out presents for each of the children. For Sansa he’d brought a dress, presented to _the most beautiful lady in all the realm._ The little girl beamed.

For Robb he brought a child-size lance “for the best jouster in all the North. If you keep practicing you might become the best in the realm.” For Jon he brought a practice sword. He wouldn’t be Oberyn if he didn’t have a direwolf on the pommel. Why he riled the lady of the castle she didn’t know. “And this,” he said offering his gift, “belongs to Aemon the Dragonknight...oh did I say that out loud? I meant Jon Snow. It’s so confusing you see, you’re just as good as him.” The little boy gleamed at the praise. 

“What did you get me?” Arya asked impatiently. 

“For the fiercest wolf, I brought Dark Sister,” he growled, lifting a tiny wooden sword. 

“That’s wood,” she clarified for him even as she extended her hand.

“This, my lady,” he said, running his hand up the wooden sword, “is a magic sword. The very one that belonged to Visenya Targaryen. When you become as good a swordswoman as your warrior queen it will magically turn into Valyrian steel, you’ll see.”

She caught Egg laughing at his explanation. Completely believing Oberyn, Arya held the sword to her chest. 

Catelyn Stark had a servant take away the gifts when the food was served.

“Prince Oberyn,” she began, “I didn’t know you had a son.”

“I don’t blame you, my lady. Neither did I.” Her brother slurped his soup loudly. Catelyn Stark’s lips pulled into a line and Elia decided that never had a man more infuriating walked the earth before her brother. 

“How can you not know?” There was no question too sacred for a three year old to ask. 

“You see, when a man and a woman-“

“That’s quite enough, my prince,” Catelyn ordered.

“Aegon’s mother does not live in Westeros,” he replied instead. “So I didn’t know to look for him. I found his mother again and she told me about my son.”

“Do you think you can find Jon’s mother?” Arya asked. For all he had grown sensitive to any talk of his mother, it seemed that there was nothing Arya did that upset the boy. At three, Arya did not understand what being a bastard meant and fought anyone who said Jon was not her brother. Elia had caught her making the usually solemn boy laugh and more than once she’d seen them both asleep as they hid away somewhere. The sight had always warmed her heart. 

Catelyn Stark excused herself from the table before Oberyn could reply. In some ways Elia was grateful. She wasn’t sure what her brother’s answer would be. Whatever he said would upset Lady Stark. The question was only how much. 

That night, for the first time in six years, Elia held her baby to sleep, singing to him as she once had. 

The next morning news that gladdened the north arrived. Balon Greyjoy had been defeated. The victory, she learned from Catelyn Stark, had sealed Robert’s legitimacy. The realm had risen in union for him and he crushed the first rebellion against his rule. 

“The longer we wait, the stronger he becomes,” she whispered to Oberyn. Beneath them, in the yard, Martyn Cassell who stayed behind as Captain of the Household guard, was dressing the boys in padding for their practice. Her Egg was about to join them. 

“Look at him,” Oberyn said, “he is still a boy. Men will not rise for a child and Balon Greyjoy is not Aegon Targaryen. It was Jon Arryn’s idea to mount Robert’s claim on the fact that he was fifth in line for the throne. He only sits comfortably because there is no Targaryen here to contest his claim.”

“The people will grow to love him and they will not know my son.”

“Or...they will grow to hate him. I promise you, Elia, when the time comes, if I have to kill that oaf myself to put Aegon on the throne, I will.”

Her son practiced against his brother. Egg was more talented with the sword. He was taller than his little brother, but Jon was faster. She watched them with glee as they pushed each other back in the yard. _Can you see this, Rhaegar?_ she found herself wondering for the first time in years. 

Both boys were laughing. On and on they went until Aegon finally won. Then he surprised her. He began telling his brother how he could win the next time. She called him over before he said something about who taught him. 

She was walking from the small sept in the castle when she heard the clacking of wooden swords and the laughter of children. 

“I’m Prince Aemon the Dragonknight,” she heard Jon call out. 

“Well, I’m Florian the Fool,” Robb shouted back. 

“I am Ser Ryam Redwyne,” said Jon, swords still clacking. 

“I am the Young Dragon,” Robb retorted. 

Jon slashed once more, knocking the practice sword out of Robb’s hand. “I’m Lord of Winterfell!” he declared in jubilation. 

“You can’t be Lord of Winterfell,” Robb said. 

“You can share!” That’s when Elia realised Arya was there. She was sat upon a small wooden horse. Next to her was Egg. It seemed neither boy paid Arya any attention, for Robb continued his words. 

“You’re bastard-born. My lady mother says you can’t ever be the Lord of Winterfell.”

“But you can be lord of another castle,” Egg piped up. “The king can make anyone lord. If I was a king, I’d make you a lord...A good king should have good men around him and you are really good with swords.” Elia noticed little Jon Snow smile at Aegon Sand. A warmth flooded her heart as her son comforted his brother. 

Jon’s smile faded “But your name is Sand, you’re a bastard, just like me.” He threw his sword on the ground and ran away. Elia tried to follow him but the boy was too quick and too familiar with the castle that was his home. She found him an hour later in Winterfell’s godswood with Arya by his side. Elia had always thought it to be an ominous place that told her she did not belong there but she told herself no god would forbid a mother comforting a hurting child. 

She sat down next to him. He looked suspiciously at her. 

“I’m praying,” she smiled in answer to his unasked question. 

“You usually pray in the sept,” pointed out Arya. 

“I thought I’d try praying here...was I wrong?”

“No.”

“What are you praying for?” she asked Jon instead.

He wrung his hands. A gesture she realised he shared with his brother. “Is it true?....Can the king really make me a lord?”

“Yes.” 

“Do you think he would, if Father asked him?”

 _Oh my dear boy,_ she thought, _your father’s castle is already yours._

“I think he would.” Robert Baratheon was many things but his friendship with Eddard Stark was renowned across the Seven Kingdoms and after years of estrangement, Balon Greyjoy’s war it would seem had reconciled them. The irony was not lost on her though. The thought of Robert making Rhaegar’s _dragonspawn_ with the woman who spurned him a lord tickled her to no end. “But…” she added, “you’d have to work hard every day in your lessons with the maester.”

“I can do that. I’m better than Robb at sums but he’s better than me in reading.”

They walked back to the keep hand in hand. “I like Aegon,” he told her. “I wish he could stay longer like his sisters do.”

“I wish he could too, little one.” _More than you know._

That night, after supper, Elia retired to her room with her son and his brother. She told them a story of a lion that had tried to rid the world of dragons so he could be the strongest predator left. “He gloated and gloated,” she said, “thinking that the dragons were gone. What he didn’t know,” she whispered leaning forward, both boys moved closer waiting upon her next words, “was that the dragons weren’t gone. They were hiding in the long grass until they learnt how to fly.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know Viserys is a bad guy but I feel so sorry for him. In canon, the moment Willem Darry died, the household staff stole their stuff and kicked him and Dany out. I know in this universe that he’s much better off in that he has Ashara and the three Kingsguard looking after him as well as Ser Willem. Still, he’s alone in this world as in canon, surrounded by those who love Egg. He also believes he’s the rightful king, but no one truly supports him. So feeling alone, he lashes out & maybe has a pinch of the family taint :( 
> 
> Credit to the reader, The Blood Wolf, who left a description of Roose Bolton in the comments of the last chapter.
> 
> As for a seven year old Aegon going undercover in Westeros, my characterisation of the smarts of a seven year old are entirely based on Bran. #TheKingOfHiding #InTheMountains even if he didn’t truly fool the Liddle they met along the way. At least Egg has a more certain death written for him and he doesn’t have a direwolf, you know...giving him away. 
> 
> I decided to play around with the seasons because I don’t have time for winter smack-bang in my story lol. So…  
> 278-283 - winter  
> 283 -287 - spring  
> 287 - 291 - summer  
> 291-294 - autumn  
> 294-299 - Winter  
> 299 - spring
> 
> I apologise for any grammar mistakes. I am so sleep deprived lmao


	11. Renly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the teensiest chapter ever. The idea was to have 3 mini POVs in one chapter but I have a serious case of writer’s block. I thought better to post something than nothing at all. Next up is Littlefinger or Varys - I haven’t decided yet.

**Renly - 299 AC**

“Why come to me with this news?” Renly leaned back into his plush seat closely studying the ever powdered Spider. Today he wore yellow silks and smelt of rosewater. The Spider had fallen into step with him after the Small Council meeting, begging for a private audience. Renly, of course, would have preferred going for a long ride with Loras. On balance, the news The Spider shared with him was just as...invigorating. Loras would have to wait, it might just make him more desperate and well, this news made Renly more amorous. Their _ride_ would be all the more enjoyable for it. Renly had no love for Lannisters, the queen more than most. Cersei had no love for him in return. He had no doubt with both her sons getting older she was looking to replace Renly and Stannis’ influences with those of her...well it would seem, her two bastards. If he wasn’t pretending to be so serious Renly would have choked on his wine as he guffawed. He could not die before he saw Cersei’s end. He wouldn’t want to miss the look on Cersei’s face when she was thrown in the black cells with her brood of bastards... _that’s only if Robert didn’t leave her a head shorter the moment he learned the news. A stag had brought about the end of a dragon, a lioness would be nothing to him._

Renly had never been close with either one of his brothers. Their parents had died when Renly was too young to remember. What Robert could not defeat with brute might, he neglected to others. He left Storm’s End to Stannis and fled for The Vale the moment he became Lord of Storm’s End. Then he left Jon Arryn to rule the realm when he became king. Stannis, on the other hand, could be no different. He had an iron will and dedication to duty to the point of madness. Renly was still a child when Robert’s Rebellion began but he had learnt then the mettle of which his brother was made. The Tyrell host defeated Robert at Ashford and gave the Targaryen forces a clear path to Storm’s End. Lords Tyrell and Rowan with their hosts had besieged Storm’s End while Lord Paxter Redwyne closed off Shipbreaker Bay. A normal man would have capitulated...sought honourable terms for surrender. After all, it was impossible to withstand a siege of that sort. Storm’s End’s granaries were not prepared for it. But Stannis was ordered to hold Storm’s End and he refused to disobey Robert’s orders even when they had to resort to eating boot leather. Renly had remembered being a boy of six who saw the Tyrell host on the fields outside Storm’s End feasting. At that age, he only wanted some food and could not understand why Stannis would make them starve. Robert had credited Ned Stark with the breaking of the siege but Renly, having been there when they considered eating their prisoners, knew that Stannis had won Robert’s Rebellion for him. Had he given up Storm’s End, the Tyrell host would have joined Rhaegar’s army swelling the Last Dragons’ ranks at The Trident. Never receiving Robert’s praise for that had turned Stannis from a serious man into a resentful, dour, man. It made him difficult to love...not that he cared much for being loved. 

Renly had learnt from both of his brothers’ strengths and their weaknesses. He had it in him to be as strong as both, generous as Robert, clever as Stannis and as just as him, diligent and loyal, terrible to his enemies like both, capable of forgiveness like Robert and as patient as Stannis.

“Stannis would be a disaster for the realm, my lord. You are the only man who might find us a...solution.” 

“Are you asking me to _kill_ my brother?” 

“Oh, my lord,” tittered The Spider, “ _everyone_ knows that The kinslayer is cursed. No, I do not tell you this news to see Lord Stannis dead. He is a good soldier and the crown would do well to retain his service. No. He will need to live for what is to come.” 

“And what is that?” 

“War of course...unless _you_ stop it before Westeros bleeds.” 

Renly raised a brow at the man. He knew he was being goaded to ask for more information. He did not want to give The Spider the pleasure, though that was not to say he wasn’t intrigued. The Spider had always been the one whose motives Renly had never truly worked out. Pycelle was Cersei’s creature, Littlefinger was Littlefinger's, although he always hedged his bets on the winner, Jon Arryn was Robert’s man. He’d raised him from a boy to a king and governed his realm all while Robert whored and drank his way to an early grave. Ser Barristan Selmy, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard was sworn to the king and though he had once stood against Robert on the battlefield, the man was one who took his vows seriously...unlike a certain _Kingslayer_ Renly could think of. _It seems that one has added cuckolding the king to his list of treasons._ And then there wasStannis unyielding in whatever duty was put on his shoulders, however he might grumble. Stannis had never forgiven Robert for being denied Storm’s End, its incomes and its banners. He had kept Storm’s End in Baratheon hands against insurmountable odds and Robert went and granted the seat to Renly ordering Stannis to hold Dragonstone, a jut of rock on the sea whose banners were pitiful and its incomes worse...not that Renly was complaining. He had prided himself on being Lord of Storm’s End...a loveable one at that. It was how Robert had won his throne and Renly had always been ambitious, _better to rule with love and strength than be feared and hated. If only Stannis would learn that lesson._

“Lord Jon Arryn is a good man,” The Spider stated, “he has always acted in the interests of our king and his realm and for the past sixteen years he has ensured that Westeros has lived in... _relative_ peace. But if he goes to the king with this news now...well, I do not believe the queen will take that very well.”

“She will kill Robert.” 

“And she will replace his Small Council with her own men. The queen has no love for you as you well know, Lord Jon Arryn is an old man and without him...Lord Stannis’ claim is weakened...he looks like a usurping uncle. If he did not fear how he would be received there would be no need for this...inquisition he has embarked on with Lord Arryn...Of course, the queen can only do that if the king does not kill the queen and her children. As you Baratheons say, _Yours is the Fury._ Lord Tywin still considers Ser Jaime his heir. I do not doubt for a moment that he will call his banners were he to be deprived of his golden son. Given the debts the crown owes House Lannister,he could bankrupt the crown if he recalls his debts... There is no question that our king must be informed of this news, but _when_ that news is revealed is of critical importance.”

“Lord Varys, please do get to the point,” Renly exhaled with some exasperation. “You would not have come to me unless you had something to ask of me.” 

“If the truth of this matter comes out, Stannis becomes Robert’s heir. You know as well as I do that Stannis will win our king no friends...at least none as powerful as to withstand the Lannisters...but you can. Stannis holds no love for golden roses. In a world where Stannis is heir, were the lions to ally themselves with the rose, your brother’s reign could be over. Sure he will have the North’s loyalty, perhaps the Dornish who still harbor hatred of Lannisters, the Riverlands and The Vale but can the realm survive that? Think of how many people would die. But you…” The Spider smirked, looking Renly up and down, “well you have the love of the most golden of roses.” 

His relation with Loras was a well-known secret, Renly would be surprised if The Spider hadn’t known of it. Loras had been sent to squire with him at Storm’s End some five years past as a means of healing the hurts of the past between their two families. _They might as well have married us,_ Renly thought. He and Loras had found love with one another and Renly had found belonging with The Tyrells. They were a close-knit family. Loras loved his brothers and they loved him in turn. Unlike his brothers the Tyrells understood the importance of being beloved by all. _Better to be loved,_ Renly knew. Stannis, of course, had never forgiven the Tyrells for Storm’s End and Renly’s... _closeness_ with the family grew to be a bone of contention between them. Stannis had asked for Storm’s End to be granted to him more than once, no doubt seeing Renly as a traitor to their cause. 

“As Master of Whisperers” Varys said, taking a sip of his wine, “my job is to protect the king’s interests from his enemies. The queen’s children are bastards. There is no doubt about it. Sooner or later the truth of it will come out. Your brother and Lord Arryn lack the information to present something to our king for the moment. That gives _you_ and I the time to introduce a new queen to our king. I hear Lord Mace Tyrell’s daughter is a renowned beauty and as yet unwed. If the king were to replace Cersei with her, Robert would have the strength and wealth of Highgarden at his back when he faced the Lannisters, Lord Tyrell would finally have a standing of worth and you, my lord, will be the one who informs our good king of the queen’s treason. Lord Arryn is an old man as you know...what do you think our king will give his most beloved brother as a reward for introducing him to a young and fertile queen who gives him legitimate heirs?” 

For the first time since they sat in this room Renly allowed himself to smile. “What is in it for you?” 

“I am a loyal servant of King Robert, my lord, his interests are mine...and Lord Stannis has no love for neither Spiders or roses. Our king’s survival depends on both.” 

Renly did not believe he cared about Robert’s interests at all but he could believe The Spider wanted to survive...he would not under Stannis. Renly had heard Stanins ask Robert to kill Varys and Littlefinger more than once. As Hand however, Renly would keep him on. Without him he would not have come to know of this treason. 

“What do you think?” Renly asked Loras. The sheets under them were too filthy to be cleaned. _I’ll have to ask Brella to burn these…_

Loras raised his head from Renly’s chest. “Margaery would be a queen...and it would give me an excuse to spend more time here...with you.” 

“Will your father support it?” 

“My father was holding out on a match between Margaery and Joffrey. This is better. It raises up House Tyrell while disgracing the Lannisters...it would make my father the most powerful man in the realm. There’s no way he would oppose this.” 

_Cersei’s end will be by my hand,_ Renly thought. First he would have to introduce Margaery to Robert. They could not reveal the children’s parentage until Margaery had an heir, bastard or not. Robert could legitimise the child afterward. Speaking before that would make Stannis heir. Renly could not have that. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In canon Renly’s initial plan was to have Robert get with Marg - I’ve just given Robert an extra year (so far) & given us a look into Renly’s planning.  
> This is another reason why the Tyrells are just political harlots. They knew Joffrey was illegitimate but were happy to marry Marg to him if it got them a little power.  
> Also Varys causing chaos in the background gives me endorphins.


	12. Petyr

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am not responsible for any vomiting you experience while reading this chapter.

**Petyr - 299 AC**

“Oh, there Petyr, please there!” 

Her saggy tits were in his face as she bounced up and down his lap. She smelt of soured milk covered by perfume. In all his life Petyr had never smelt a worse combination on a woman.  _ Surely even the one copper whores in Flea Bottom do not smell so vile. _

“Yes, Petyr,” she moaned, “please, right there. Oh, I’m so close Petyr.” 

He had to eat a plateful of fermented crab to get him ready to do the deed with her. All those years ago in Riverrun it hadn’t been so difficult. Back then she was a pretty girl, nowhere near Cat of course, but passably pretty. She was high-breasted, dimpled, delicate. All that remained of that girl were the thick auburn tresses that fell past her waist. The years had turned Lysa into something resembling a fat cow, although even cow’s milk smelt better than this. 

“Ahhhh, Petyr.” She clenched all around him. “Oh Petyr, you are so good to me.” 

“It is you who is good to me, sweetling,” he crooned, pulling out of her body to tug himself to his own finish. Surely a cloth deserved his release more than her.  _ At least for now…  _

She crawled across the bed to him, sitting up to throw her arms around him, hugging him from behind before her putrid lips began to trail a wet path up his neck. “Oh Lysa...you are so good to me.” The words were a strain but this was the cost of his rise to power. He’d bed a hundred Lysas to get what he wanted. Besides, the deranged woman was keen enough to grant it to him on a golden platter.  _ She does have her uses I suppose.  _

“Oh sweetling,” Petyr said, stopping her meandering hands from making their way to his cock. She had abused it quite enough already. “I cannot wait for us to truly be together.”

“Oh me too, Petyr. We will not let them take away Robert from me. Oh Petyr, I knew I could come to you and you would help me.” She wrapped her arms tighter around his neck, rubbing their cheeks together. Her breath was even more rotten from here. Petyr had always taken care to look and smell the part of a respectable lord. His breath always smelt of mint and his clothes carried the sweetest of perfumes. It took quite the effort for him not to gag when she moved even closer. It would not do well to make his feelings known. The tongue-tied, timid girl at Riverrun had grown to be a reckless, unhinged woman whose moods were more prone to change than the wind. 

“I have always loved you, dear. I would do  _ anything  _ for you.” 

“Not always,” she pouted, removing her hands from around him.  _ Oh here we go again.  _ “You always preferred Cat. Even the first time. It was me and you called me Cat.” 

Petyr’s stomach clenched.  _ No. It cannot be true. It was Cat. Cat gave me her maidenhead.  _

Dread creeped over him like an icy chill, numbing his brain. “Lysa… what do you mean?” he managed to croak, trying to keep his voice level, it would not do to unravel next to this unstable enormity of a woman. 

“Catelyn kissed you in the godswood, but she never meant it, she never wanted you. She didn’t even like it when you put your tongue in her mouth. It was always me who liked it. I loved everything about you.” 

“And I, you, sweetling. We were all children then but I am with you, not Cat.”  _ Thanks to that reckless fool Brandon Stark and your lord father.  _

“Good, because Catelyn laughed at you at her betrothal feast but it was me who came to your room and you called me Cat. Why would you do that?” She plopped herself next to him. She made a loud wet noise as she did so. The rolls of her stomach bounced. Petyr had perfected masking his true feelings the day Cat married Ned Stark. When the fool Brandon died he’d written to her promising that he would do anything to make her happy. They could even run away to Braavos, where his great-grandfather was born. He would do anything to make her happy. A reply never came. He was sure Hoster Tully had burnt the letter before she could reply. The old man Petyr had taken for a father had sent him off at death’s door when Brandon Stark cut him from navel to collarbone. And Catelyn married Ned Stark. It had been years since he last heard from sweet Cat. She had been the greatest object of his affections. She still was. A lifetime ago, they had played at being lovers like those in the songs. Once, they had accompanied Hoster Tully to Seagard, passing by Oldstones in the process. Cat had pretended to be Jenny and Petyr her Prince of Dragonflies. Lysa had insisted on coming along. Though he hadn’t said it at the time, he named her the Ghost of High Heart in his mind. 

“Petyr! Did you hear me?” the fat cow pronounced.

“Yes, sweetling.” He turned to her moving ever closer to kiss her neck. The perfume was strongest here and it masked the smell somewhat. “Oh Lysa, that was a lifetime ago. I’m here with you, my love. I love you so much.” He moved his fingers to her wet lower lips. Fat and swollen even without being touched She was swollen all over. 

“Oh Petyr.” She leaned back. Arching up into his fingers. This woman who had tried to take Cat’s place. He had only fucked her when Cat had given her favour to Brandon out of hurt. He would never have fucked her the first time if he knew it was her. Petyr had been so in love with Cat. They used to practice kissing in the godswood. 

He inserted a finger into the moaning cow, then another. 

Cat used to throw her arms around his neck and plant her lips on his. She was older than him, more beautiful than anyone he had ever seen and she had chosen to kiss him. When her betrothal was announced he had danced with her all night. After the sixth dance he had tried to kiss her, declaring his love to her for all to see but ever dutiful Cat had pushed him away. She defined her life by the Tully words.  _ Family, duty, honour.  _ It wouldn’t do to kiss another while betrothed, even if the Stark heir was older than her and a brute besides. Petyr drank his hurt away until he was too blind to walk alone to his rooms. The Blackfish had carried him all the way and then Cat came.  _ Beautiful Cat.  _ She had taken off her gowns and his breeches and sank on to him. Every one of his dreams came true that night. Except now he learnt it wasn’t Cat. It was  _ her.  _ She had taken away from him something that belonged to Cat. Cat was supposed to be his first and she had hidden it until this moment. Petyr was always going to kill her. She was too loose mouthed to keep around but he had to choose his timing correctly. Now when the time came he’d do it with pleasure. She had taken advantage of him. 

“Ah, Petyr. Do you love me truly?” She was groping her sagging tits, eyes screwed shut. 

“Yes, sweetling.” He pushed in a third finger. He had met her in her rooms, every one of her guards belonged to him. There was no risk of being caught. Her husband had already started shitting uncontrollably, it was only a matter of time before he croaked. “I love you so much.” 

The first thing he did the moment he left her rooms was order a bath called for him.

She had come running to him after Prince Joffrey’s nameday tourney. Petyr had lost a bet to the king that day and lost his Valyrian steel dagger. “Oh Petyr, that vile old man means to take my Robert away from me. Walder Frey asked to foster my Robert but Jon refused...He wants to give him to Stannis!! It’ll make him a man, he says. I can’t let them take him. They took our baby from us. Robert is all I have left. Petyr, please you have to help!” 

Petyr’s great-grandfather had been a Braavosi sellsword in the hire of Lord Corbray. When Petyr’s grandfather was knighted he took the Titan of Braavos as his sigil and as a landed knight was granted a few acres of land on a jut of rock on the littlest of The Fingers across from The Vale. It happened to be by luck that his father had met Lord Hoster Tully during the War of the Ninepenny Kings. A minor lord befriended one of the Great Lords of Westeros and his son was fostered by said Great Lord. Hoster, at the beginning, had treated Petyr as if he were one of his children. He was close in age to Edmure and Lysa and Cat had taken him for a playmate as well. At that age Petyr’s life was a song. The son of the lord of a tower with no name was raised with the Tullys of Riverrun, in love with Riverrun’s eldest daughter. And she returned his fancies. He remembered that first kiss. He had kissed the girl of his dreams. Petyr felt himself harden in his bath and tugged himself. His own hand would give him more pleasure than Lysa. 

Back then he believed that was all that was required. A willing boy and girl but life was no song he learnt to his own sorrow. 

Hoster Tully would not give his most beloved child to someone as lowborn as Petyr. Not when he could have the might of Winterfell as kin. “ _What do you have to offer my daughter?”_ Hoster Tully spat. “The truth of the matter is that you are heir to stones, sheep pellets and nothing more. You cannot have her hand. Now leave,” Petyr had refused to let it lie. He threw the gauntlet and asked Brandon Stark to duel with him for Cat’s hand. It was hopeless he knew but he was a boy in love and in the songs sometimes the weakest of underdogs won the heart of the fairest of ladies. Or so he thought...until Cat broke his heart. She denied him the favor she so readily gave the northern brute, and to make it worse Edmure, who had been his brother, chose to squire for Brandon Stark. At least he had the decency to try and visit him. Cat had not come once. Cat for whom he would have died. But Lysa came. _Stupid, gullible, sweet Lysa._ And then Hoster Tully twisted the knife. He had their baby killed. Back then Petyr might have accepted Lysa instead of Cat but Hoster Tully made it clear that Petyr was a no one in his world. Merely someone he had given some alms. _I am more than no one now, Hoster. I hold your future in my hands and I will see to it that your legacy burns into ashes._

Petyr would never let them dismiss him ever again. What was one man’s weakness became his strength. He was too lowborn which meant no one had ever expected him to have any smarts of deviousness. Lysa,  _ sweet, fat Lysa,  _ had come to him when she married and told him of what Hoster had done to the child. “We will make them pay,” he promised her. He would. It was all he had lived to do for nearly two decades. 

He had finger-fucked Lysa into asking her husband to grant him the customs role at Gulltown. It would not do well to get the wench pregnant with his bastard...though perhaps he should have. His son would be Lord of the Eyrie. A grand fuck you to those who destroyed his life, thinking he was too lowborn for it.

It wasn’t hard for him to increase the income of the customs threefold, though Lysa told her husband it was ten. Jon Arryn, precious, clever Jon Arryn took his lovely wife’s word for it. Thus began Petyr’s climb up the ladder. First came more appointments and responsibilities in the Vale and then King’s Landing. 

“Dear Petyr,” Jon Arryn crowed, “You seem to have the gift of rubbing two golden dragons to breed a third. We could do with a man of your talents in King’s Landing.” 

“I told you, Jon. Petyr has always been clever,” Lysa cheered, licking her lips at Petyr. No doubt expecting thanks...of a different kind. She was easier on the eyes then and he might have even said he found some release in her. 

From there his rise was arrow-swift. Petyr was made for court. He enjoyed the devious games and he enjoyed the power that came with it. He had increased the crown’s revenues tenfold, for true this time, and had replaced every office under the Master of Coin with his own men. The four Keepers of the Keys belonged to him as did the King’s Counter, the King’s Scales, all the harbour masters, toll collectors and wine factors. He controlled the money of the entire treasury. And none of them could read his accounting. They all depended on him. Of course, no one looked closely at the figures, Petyr had kept the money coming in and the king had spent it lavishly.  _ A master juggler,  _ they called him for balancing the books...or cooking them depending on who you asked. To all in court, he was  _ Littlefinger,  _ a man so low-born he couldn’t possibly be a threat. Petyr didn’t mind. He’d grown quite rich and bought oh so many men at court with it. Knowledge he learnt was power. And knowledge of a man’s debts... _ made any man susceptible to being bought. _

That’s how he came to know of the queen’s...incestuous activities with her golden brother. Petyr had kept that knowledge filed away for a rainy day but then Stannis had come to know of it too and asked Jon Arryn to confirm his suspicions. Robert held no love for Stannis, were the joyless man to accuse the queen of adultery there was every chance he’d lose his head before he provided his evidence. Jon Arryn was something else, however. Robert  _ would  _ listen to the man who raised him. Sure, he might ignore him when it came to issues of spending and frivolity but in a manner as grave as this, Robert would take Jon Arryn at his word. The man was too smart to act without evidence anyway.

In that event, Stannis would become heir. The man had no love for  _ Littlefinger.  _ Petyr had heard him tell Robert to take his head and be done with it. Stannis would find everything Petyr had built and then he really would lose his head. But...Stannis could never have that voice if he never became heir…

When Lysa came to him crying about Jon Arryn sending her boy away to foster, Petyr could have thanked any and every god. She handed him the opportunity to destroy all those who looked down on him. He would need Robert to stay in power...for as long as Robert was in power he was safe. Everyone else he could use in his ascension, all while he destroyed them. Robert famously only had two men he could count on. With one...dead, he would turn to his old friend, his brother, Ned Stark. Honourable Ned, Valiant Ned, stupid Ned if he was anything like his brother. War between Lannister and Stark would destroy both houses...or perhaps just the Starks. He wanted Ned Stark to pay for taking Cat from him and if she chose him by choice, well then...she would learn to regret her decision. The Lannisters Petyr could work with. Cersei Lannister was a fool who thought herself clever. She kept the only Lannister with any wits about him far from any power and that served Petyr well. He’d learnt to be helpful to all and the queen was the easiest to fool. Ned Stark, however, even here, a place where he hadn’t stepped foot in for sixteen years, was praised for his honour and his justice.  _ Another Stannis...though no one ever praised Stannis.  _

War served Petyr well. All he had to do was choose the right side and collect enough titles to make himself Lord of the Eyrie.  _ A final fuck you to Hoster Tully.  _ He would rule the lands his grandfather came to a poor sellsword. Perhaps he would even marry Cat. Winterfell he always imagined was too dreary a place for her. He could bring back warmth to her life and together they could rule three kingdoms. The thought made him smile. He stepped out of his bath and began to dress. 

“Oh Lysa, I’m so sorry to hear that,” he said to her, placing his hands on her shoulder. “I am so sorry you will have to lose Sweetrobin to a place as dark and lonely as Dragonstone. It is ever  _ so  _ cruel to separate a mother from her son.” That only made her more hysterical.

“Petyr! Please,” she begged, grabbing handfuls of his black velvet doublet. “Please you have to help me stop him.” 

“Lysa…” he gasped. “No. No.” He shook his head. “You cannot be asking me to do something so vile.” 

Her eyes widened when she understood what he implied. “Petyr! Please, I beg you. He will take my son away from me. Oh, Petyr please.” Her screeching hurt his ears. 

“Shh Lysa,” he whispered against her cheek. She was taller than him. His lips came away with the taste of the powder she caked herself with. “No need for your tears, my love. I have come to love your son as my own. I...cannot bear to be separated from him either. There is a solution but it is not a pleasant one nor is it honourable.” 

“I’ll do it, whatever it is. Please Petyr. I can’t let them take another baby from me.” 

He gave her Tears of Lys and thus began the end of Jon Arryn. 

Petyr was straightening the mockingbird on his cloak when Lysa came hurtling into his room. “He’s gone, Petyr! He’s gone,” she chirped. 

“I hope he is at rest now, my love,” he said hugging her. “But…” He took a hold of her hands. “We are not out of the woods yet.”    
“What do you mean?” Her eyes were wide and already beginning to tear up. 

“It’s the king...he means to foster Robert at Casterly Rock.”

“No, no, no!” She shook her head violently, stepping back each time. “No. He  _ cannot _ do that! Oh, Petyr. I cannot bear my son being so far from me with a man as horrible as Tywin Lannister. Petyr, please! Tell me what to do.” 

“You could write to Cat.”

“I will not have my son fostered out anywhere Petyr! Not with Cat or anyone else. He needs to be beside me.” 

“And he will, my sweet love. He will. But for that to happen we have to ensure that the king no longer sees Tywin as an ally.”

“How?” 

“Well, what do you think the king will do when he finds out the Lannisters killed our good Hand of the King…” 

“But they didn’t-”

“They did, my love. And now we have to warn Cat. They are going to her home. Ned Stark has to protect his friend from those killers...and you will go home to The Eyrie where all the swords are sworn to your son. We will protect him, sweetling. I promise.” 

Lysa sent the letter shortly after court left for Winterfell.  _ A secret language,  _ he laughed when he remembered. He’d never mastered it when they were children. 

Unfortunately for him, Stannis left for Dragonstone the moment Jon Arryn died. Still, he didn’t let that dampen his mood. No. Petyr grinned as he watched the rider disappear into the night. His climb up the ladder was about to begin...as was the fall of all those who’d mocked him. Stark, Arryn, Tully...they would all come to rue their arrogance. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Littlefinger genuinely thought he took both girls’ maidenhoods unfortunately for him Lysa sexually abused him the first time when he was too inebriated to even know who he was with - he just assumed it was Cat. The second time was when he was injured from duelling Brandon. That time he knew it was Lysa hence why he used to boast about taking both girls’ maidenhoods.  
> In AGOT he says to Sansa, “Life is not a song, sweetling. You may learn that one day to your sorrow.” - I really think he was talking about himself here. I would say poor guy but I think we have to draw the line of empathy somewhere right?  
> I’d like to think at this stage, before he’s met Sansa and decided to be even creepier than he becomes at the start of AGOT, he was still holding a candle for Cat. Perhaps his plan was to get with Lysa but he’d switch plans for Cat...I get the feeling his primary plan was to destroy everyone he blamed for his circumstances. He’d make up the rest along the way.  
> As a side note, poor Stannis. Everyone wants to see him dead. All he’s ever done is just be right lol (and grind his teeth).


	13. Arianne

**Arianne**

Arianne had been caught. They made it as far as Vaith, the Red Dunes were within sight. From there they would only need to go up the dunes, perhaps they’d stop at Hellholt. _No we couldn’t Lord Uller would turn me back._ Well.. they’d….they’d cross the Dornish Desert, make their way up the Prince’s Pass, through the Dornish Marches...and then...and then she’d be at The Reach. _I am lying to myself,_ she knew. It was a desperate act by a desperate woman. That’s who she was even if her father refused to see it. She was a grown woman and Dorne was hers by all the laws of primogeniture and traditions of Dorne. She was Doran Martell’s eldest daughter. No matter how hard he tried to deny it, the Seat of the Sun was hers. Not Quentyn’s. She would not let him take her birthright from her and give it to his favourite child. I came before Quentyn. _I will be the Ruling Princess of Dorne whatever he says. I will not be denied._

Doran Martell had once been her father. The man she loved dearest of all. Even when her mother left for Norvos to get away from his stubbornness, Arianne looked up to her father, wishing he would see her, truly see her, the way her uncle Oberyn had seen every one of his daughters. 

She was four-and-ten when she learnt how much her father despised her. She’d gone to her father’s solar to give him a goodnight kiss but he wasn’t there. He’d left a candle burning beside which she found a letter lying incomplete beside it, a letter to Quentyn, off at Yronwood. Prince Doran, the father she loved, told Quentyn that he must do all that his maester and his master-at-arms required of him, because ‘ _one day you will sit where I sit and rule all Dorne, and a ruler must be strong of mind and body_.’ The words had broken her heart and made her angry to tears even now. 

Arianne used to think her uncle was so different from her father because he only had daughters, the Sand Snakes. There was hot-tempered Obara, the daughter of an Oldtown whore. She was named for her father and like him chose the spear as a weapon. There was Nymeria, daughter of a Volantene noble, slim and slender and born a beauty, though that did not make her any less dangerous than her sister. Then came Sarella who had inherited her father’s bookishness, though only those who truly knew the Red Viper knew him to be such a man. She loved each one of her cousins, Elia, daughter of Ellaria, named for their aunt Princess Elia Martell of Dorne, Obella carrier of the Morningstar and Obara reborn, and the babies little Dorea and Loreza, children who Arianne had helped raise. But the closest of all her cousins to her was Tyene. She was the sweet sister Arianne never had. They did everything together. They splashed in the pools and fountains of the Water Gardens, and rode into battle perched on one another’s naked backs. She and Tyene had learned to read together, learned to ride together, learned to dance together. When they were ten Arianne had stolen a flagon of wine, and the two of them had gotten drunk together. They shared meals and beds and jewelry. They would have shared their first man as well, but Drey got too excited and spurted all over Tyene’s fingers the moment she drew him from his breeches. 

And like the dependable sister she was, she had run away with her in search of Highgarden. Doran had refused to let Arianne go to Highgarden to meet with Willas Tyrell, after he turned down every eligible noble bachelor. Arianne was even willing to overlook Willas’ crippled leg. She heard he was a kind man, and he’d proven it by choosing to maintain an amiable relation with her uncle even after the accident that made the rest of his family Oberyn’s sworn enemies. Willas was also heir to Highgarden, and would one day be lord of the armies that would help her take back her birthright. Arianne Nymeros Martell would not be usurped. 

She had never wanted it to come to this. She had never wanted to plan for a war against her father. He had once been the most beloved person to her. _Why won’t he see me?_ She felt the hot tears begin to course down her face. No one could see her here anyway so she let them fall. Her uncle had locked her up in a cabin on the ship all alone, separate from Tyene and Garin who was closer to her than any of her brothers - they had shared his mother’s milk and had never left each other’s side since they were babes. Spotted Sylva would have joined them she knew, but Sylva had been called back to Spottswood. 

Oberyn Martell was a better man than her father, however. Arianne learnt that when she was barely a maiden herself. He had a son, one that she had never met, but a son nonetheless and it did not make him love any of his daughters any less. In fact, his son, Aegon Sand, had never come to Sunspear to live with them, although his daughters did. He insisted on it. Only Sarella, and later Nym, had ever seen him. He’d taken the boy to Winterfell once and the second to Deepwood Motte but never to Sunspear. 

She wished her father would see her the way Oberyn saw his daughters. She wished her uncle Oberyn was her father more than once. She knew she was born to do her duty. She would have to marry and give heirs to Dorne. She was a princess, it was what she was born to do but her father, it seemed, wanted her to suffer. For what crime she did not know. Sometimes Arianne had thought the reason her father had only proposed marriage with men old enough to be her grandsires was because she had remained the ugly girl that no young man would want. She certainly thought so after King Robert’s brother Renly had come to Dorne. She had tried to entice him, but _he_ had only looked at her with amusement under which was masked pity. _Perhaps if I had a cock he would have taken me seriously._ Arianne was half a boy then anyway with a flat chest and no beauty to speak of. She used to spend hours gazing at the portrait of Princess Daenerys that hung in Sunspear. She was the most beautiful woman Arianne had ever seen and Arianne wanted to be beautiful like her aunt Elia and as beautiful as Ashara Dayne who she had only ever heard of in the stories. 

She was no longer the pudgy flat-chested girl. Nor was she ugly she knew. Daemon Sand had proved her wrong when they became lovers for a time. _And Drey wants me as does his brother._ Daemon Sand, bastard that he was, had once cared for her enough to seek her hand in marriage from her father once he earned his knighthood. Her father had refused him and she did not doubt he would have refused Drey and Deziel. She wondered if Darkstar would have asked for her hand if he lived long enough. If there was a handsomer man in Dorne, Arianne had never seen him. Her own uncle had killed him, after saying more than once that Darkstar was a poison. Gerold Dayne had tried and failed to kill his young cousin the Lord of Starfall for his claim. He would have forcibly married Allyria to do so. Her father and uncle were touchy about Starfall and had looked after the Daynes of Starfall as if they were family. 

_He doesn’t want me to marry a Dornishman,_ she told herself after her father refused so many requests for her hand. And she would have accepted it if it were only that. There were pleasant enough nobles outside of Dorne...ones who still had their teeth.

When Hoster Tully had invited her to Riverrun to meet his heir, she lit candles to the Maid. She had spent a year in the North with her aunt Elia by that point and had gotten to know Lady Catelyn and her children. The lady was lovely enough, if a little precious about bastards. Arianne would know the family Edmure did not and would tell him about his nephews and his nieces. _He’d like that,_ she thought. The Tully family words were _Family, Duty, Honour._ Family first, everyone knew that. And Edmure was related to the lords of Winterfell and the Eyrie besides. They could help her take back her birthright. But of course, Prince Doran declined the invitation. 

Her father tried to marry her to Ben Beesbury instead. A man with no real lands to speak of and who was nearly eighty besides and toothless on top of that... not to mention blind! _Why does father hate me so?_

She would scream if it would make any difference. Her uncle Oberyn was as loving as he was 

unmovable when he chose. When he first caught them she had shouted and slapped and spat at anyone who came close but he had only allowed her to scream until she was hoarse. Then they locked her in the cabin. For an entire night she had called for Tyene and Garin but no voice returned. She had tried again the night after but again, nothing. 

They had come off the ship so she knew they were nearing Sunspear, but she had no way of truly knowing. She came off the ship and into a litter, the blinds of which she could not move. She wouldn’t scream here, however. _One day I will rule these people, no matter what Father intends. It would not do for them to see their Ruling Princess dragged back to her home like a wild catch after a hunt. I am Dorne. I am Arianne Nymeros Martell and I am Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken._

They were probably moving through the Shadow City, although it was eerily quiet. _Perhaps it’s still too early for the bazaars to open._ She wondered if her father would truly ship her off to the Lord of The Crossing. He had spoken about wedding her to Walder Frey, a man of ninety, old enough to be her father’s grandsire, let alone her own. Doran Martell was one and fifty now. He was not a warrior who crafted himself into a weapon as her uncle did but her father was no fat lord who sat counting his coppers either.

Her father’s father had once suffered from gout. She heard from both her father and uncle that by the end he had swollen joints, reddened so as to be grotesque to look at. _“One knee was an apple,”_ her uncle had said, _“and the other a melon,”_ her father finished as he ate his dry chicken. Doran Martell, it seems never allowed himself to enjoy the finer tastes in life. He avoided meat like the plague, and fish as well, though Sunspear was by the sea. He only ate carefully selected foods by Maester Calleote in his attempt to put gout at bay. And it worked, he was a healthy man, though Arianne wondered sometimes if he would be a less grumpy man keen on ridding her life of all enjoyment if he allowed himself to eat well from time to time. 

“Tyene?” she called out when she heard footsteps on marble flooring. We must be in the Tower of the Sun... _or the Tower of the Spear if Father wishes to imprison me._ They were not going up many stairs though so she told herself it had to be the Tower of the Sun...her father’s solar was near the ground floor. No voice answered hers. _Where is Tyene? Oberyn is her own father, he would not hurt her,_ she reminded herself, though that did little to settle the ants of fear that crawled all over her body. Tyene had only followed her as did Garin.

“Garin? Garin can you hear me?” Again there was nothing but silence. On and on it went. 

Arianne stank. Her uncle had not allowed her to bathe even once since catching her at Vaith. Her food was brought to her cabin and not a single one of the servants spoke to her, no matter how hard she tried to speak to them. Her hair was all a mess. She was sure in this state even the Lord of the Crossing would reject her. _Good,_ she told herself, _I’d rather fling myself off the top of either tower before I marry him. They might sing songs about me like they did of Lady Ashara..._ Although Ashara Dayne’s story was one of a tragic love story. Arianne had no man she was in love with. 

When she went North she was surprised that none of the children in Winterfell had known of that tale. Sansa, little gossip that she was at nine had been surprised that her father had once loved another. Of course, _she_ said, over lemon cakes and tea, that it was _"like a sad story from a song."_ And spoke of how she had a heart full of pity for her father and his poor lady love. Arya, the little terror of Winterfell, so much like her own cousin Elia Sand, and only a year younger than her sister denied such a thing could ever happen...though she snuck into Arianne’s bed later that night to ask if Ashara was Jon Snow’s mother. It had been six years since Arianne had been to Winterfell. She wondered what Lord Stark’s heir would look like now. Perhaps she could marry him. One child could rule the North and another Dorne. She was older than him but by now he’d be a man grown and age mattered less then. 

Their age difference was six or so years. The same as that of her aunt and her husband. Her aunt Elia had married a minor lordling from the north...well, she would point out that Ethan Glover had vassals of his own but for a woman who would have one day been queen, anything after the Crown Prince was a step down. Though anyone who saw her with her husband would never know that or think that the few years between them were an issue. Her aunt had spent four of the winter years in Dorne and her husband had come south for one of them but could not stay for the whole of the winter. They left for the North during a false spring that lasted a few months, taking Nym with them. Winter had lasted another year by now. Arianne had always felt there was a sizzling fire between them at all times. _Perhaps that fire is something all northmen share,_ she thought. Though the more Arianne thought of it, she couldn’t see the fire she saw between her aunt and her husband between Ned Stark and _his_ wife. The Stark lord was the most serious man Arianne had ever seen. _Perhaps his fire died with Ashara._

Her litter stopped in front of a room. “In! Now!” her uncle ordered her. 

“Where’s Tyene?” 

“Do as you’re told Arianne. For once. Do as you’re told.” Her uncle sounded more tired than angry. “Tyene is fine as is Garin. Go inside. Your maid awaits you. Have a bath, you look ridiculous and smell worse.” He couldn’t help but smother a laugh. Her uncle Oberyn was a tall man, slender and graceful and everything Arianne had once wanted her consort to be. He was the example of what she wanted all men to be. People said he had black viper eyes but when he spoke to his children and by extension her and her brothers, his eyes hid smiles that his enemies would say never existed. 

“I will not marry Walder Frey,” she snapped, refusing to return his smile. “I don’t care what Father says. Or you. Why does he hate me so uncle? I wouldn’t have run away if he only let me marry someone worthy. How can he expect me to sleep with a man who I’m not sure can even get his cock up to do the deed.” 

“I assure you,” her uncle smirked, “Walder Frey’s cock works. He has a castle full of whelps. Now in. Wash yourself. You look more a wood’s witch than a Princess of Dorne.” 

She couldn’t believe her uncle was taking pleasure in her pain. She wished her mother was here. Mellario of Norvos. Her fair, kind mother had left Doran and his stubbornness. _Perhaps I should have run away to her._

 _I hate him,_ she thought. _I hate him. I only wanted to please him but he never saw me...never cared for me. He only cared about his sons. What does Trystane know about marriage so as to be betrothed all while I rot alone with wrinkled old men as my only options?_

Her father fostered out Quentyn with Lord Yronwood, giving him strong ties to one of the most powerful of the Dornish lords and then married him to Lord Randyll Tarly’s daughter. The man was the most unpleasant of Marcher lords, a cold, hard man who had no true love for Dorne but he had respect for Princess Elia and had fought for her husband in Robert’s Rebellion. He was the only man who had defeated the would-be king. Randyll Tarly was the finest soldier in the realm, it was said. And he’d married his daughter to Quentyn. Arianne thought it ridiculous. Her brother was the most unimpressive man she had ever laid eyes on. Her aunt had brokered the engagement herself, travelling to Hornhill three years ago. Quentyn married Talla Tarly two years past. 

And while her father was organising betrothals with the daughters of powerful men for his sons, he had her learning old histories and geographies, pouring over annotated maps, dry-as-dust studies of the laws of Dorne, and The Seven-Pointed Star, as if he were sending her off to become a septa. If she didn’t know he was lining up Quentyn to be his heir, she would have thought he was teaching her all these things to make her an effective ruler but no...he hated her. 

Bellandra, who had been her mother’s bedmaid, came to wash her. “Where’s Cedra?” Arianne demanded. Cedra had been the bedmaid who had washed her usually and Cedra was a gossip. 

“She is busy, little princess. With your cousin.” 

“Tyene?” 

“Yes, dear.” Bellandra smiled at her knowingly. 

“Why are you smiling?” 

“Your father will tell you, my love,” she replied soaping her back. 

“Is he furious with me?” she found herself asking. Why hope soared in her heart when Bellandra shook her head she did not know. She was angry with him yet all she ever wanted to do was to please him. She only wished she knew how to do so. She refused to let the tears fall before she gave Doran Martell a piece of her mind. 

“He was worried, little one.” Arianne had not been little for a long time. She was a woman grown, flowered and with ample teats. _Though I am still little._ Her mother was only five foot two and Arianne had inherited her height... _or lack thereof._

“Is my betrothed here? Is that why he’s not furious?” The Twins seemed too far away for Walder Frey to come to Dorne personally and so quickly. 

“Who would that be dear?” Bellandra smiled again. As if Arianne’s pain was something funny.

“Bellandra please,” she begged, tears falling already, “Please, for the love you bore my mother, tell me what is happening. Why are you happy? He’s going to marry me to an old man, twice as old as him. What’s funny about that?” 

“Shh, sweet one.” Bellandra only poured water over her hair. 

Bellandra called for food for her. Morra and Mellei brought a kid roasted with lemon and honey, grape leaves stuffed with raisins, onions, mushrooms, and fiery dragon peppers. Then she dressed her in loose layers of flowing purple silk and yellow samite before Areo Hotah, her mother’s man originally, came to collect her. Arianne loved his seamed, scarred face and his gruff, deep voice and thick Norvoshi accent was a sound of her childhood, but as he appeared in front of her with his hand on the smooth shaft of long axe, _his ash-and-iron wife_ , she felt as if he were walking her to her death. 

She tried to make conversation with him. _Why am I scared? It’s only Father._ “How are you today, Areo?” 

“Good, princess. How fare you?” 

Everyone seemed too chirpy. Even Areo smiled, a true one too. Not the smile he’d wear to cheer her up. It made her calm for a moment too. _It’s only Father. He’ll tell me he’s disappointed and he’ll find me another greybeard but Doran is never cruel to me. I am still his child. I will refuse Walder Frey like I refused Lord Beesbury and Grandison before him._

She smiled. It wouldn’t be so bad. All the servants smiled at her, as did Ricasso, her father’s seneschal, and Maester Calleote, her father’s cousin Ser Manfrey sent her a sad smile. Alyse Ladybright her father’s treasurer, stopped her to kiss her cheeks and Maester Myles fell in step with them. Dread settled in her stomach. Everyone was being too nice to her. _Why was Lady Ladybright so contrite?_

Arianne’s eyes kept their focus on the throne room which they reached and then passed. She looked back when Areo took her hand in his and Maester Myles the other. “No!” she shouted. “No! No!” She tried to wrestle out of their hold on her when she realised they were walking her _out_ of the castle. 

“Areo! Please tell me, where am I going? ” she pleaded desperately, not knowing what she feared but they had put her hands on her, they knew if she knew what they were doing she would protest. It scared her that she did not know where they were leading her. She thought of Lady Ladybright with her sad smile. _What are they going to do to me?_ Fear and dread had her stomach locked up tight. She locked her teeth together, struggling to breathe with each step. 

They put her in a litter, Bellandra was already inside. She realised before they forced her in that the guards in front of her were carrying chests. She recognised an old oak chest Lady Catelyn had gifted her in Winterfell. It was hers. _No! No! He is sending me to Walder Frey._

She jumped outside the litter and Areo grabbed her, carrying her over his shoulder. He walked back into the castle grounds but before Arianne could breathe a sigh of relief she realised he was walking in the direction of the undercity walkway that would take them outside the castle walls and to the coast. 

“Please, captain,” she cried. “Please, Areo, you have known me since I was little? You always kept me safe, as you kept my lady mother safe when you came with her from Great Norvos to be her shield in a strange land. I need you to keep me safe, please. My father will send me to marry an old man, even older than you can imagine. Please.” 

“You ran away, little princess,” he said, not unkindly though his voice was gruff.

“I only wanted to escape Walder Frey. Please, you have to help me!” Her voice was hoarse. 

“I am sorry, little one. My prince commanded me to take you to him and it is for me to obey.” 

“What about my mother’s commands to keep me safe?” 

“Speak to your father first, little one.” He did not speak to her again even as she pleaded. 

The galley appeared in front of her once they left the tunnel, a great big ship. Too big for travel to other Dornish lands. It’s high, square forecastle rose behind the bow, the four masts carried both square and fore-and-aft sails. _He’s really sending me away. He’s sending me to The Twins. I’ll kill myself before I get there, I swear it!_

Areo carried her all the way inside. Behind her she saw Bellandra trailing her. 

Her father was in the lower deck, playing a game of Cyvasse she realised when Areo put her down. He was playing against her uncle. She ran at them, intending to smash his stupid board to pieces but swift as an arrow her uncle caught her before she could reach them. 

Arianne spat at where her father sat, each one of her words more acidic than the last.  
“What kind of father are you?” she shouted scornfully, over her uncle’s arm - she couldn’t reach his shoulder. “I am your heir! You want Quentyn to have everything. You always favoured him over me! You mean to give him Dorne, don’t trouble yourself to deny it,” she sped on. “I read your letter.” She twisted her mouth as she recited the words. “‘ _One day you will sit where I sit and rule all Dorne,’_ you wrote him. Tell me, Father, when did you decide to disinherit me? Was it the day that Quentyn was born, or the day that I was born? What did I ever do to make you hate me so?” A grimace of hurt made its way to her father’s face but he did not say anything back to her. 

“You get him Lord Tarly’s daughter. And me? Me your daughter and heir you want to send to Walder Frey’s bed. The man could be _your_ grandfather and mine own great grandfather but it’s better for you to get your problematic daughter out of the way isn’t it? First you send my mother away with your cruelty and now you mean to do the same to me!” 

Her father had tears in his eyes and stared at her for a while. 

“Why are you so quiet? Speak,” she shouted. “You planned to disinherit me so you might as well tell me why!” 

Her uncle turned back to her father to say, “I told you she wasn’t ready to be a queen.” 

Arianne pulled away from him. Confused. Words left her. She stared into both of their black eyes, disorientated. It was no secret both of them hated Tywin Lannister for what he did to Aunt Elia’s children. No words found their way to her lips, as if she was stuck underwater. The ship rocked even where it was at anchor, everything around her seemed slow and warbled. 

“Cat got your tongue? You had plenty to say before. A queen who cannot speak…” He tutted and turned to his brother again, “she really will not do,” her uncle said letting her go to take his seat beside his brother. Between the two of them lay the board. The pieces were a deep red and onyx. Arianne had never seen such a board before. 

“Perhaps you are right, Oberyn,” her father pronounced, wiping the lone tear that made its way down his cheek and smiling at her. It was a kind smile. That disorientated her even more than she already was. Then mockingly he said to his brother, “Elia should have listened to me. I told her Mace Tyrell’s daughter would be a better option.” 

“What are you talking about?” There was no one else in this part of the ship with them. It was just her, her father, Uncle Oberyn and Areo Hotah with his long axe barring her exit. “Are you not sending me to the Lord of the Crossing?” Her voice was shaky and her hands clammy. 

“Given all the trouble you’ve caused, mayhaps I should.” 

“I still think Sansa Stark would be a better option,” joked her uncle, moving an elephant on the board as he did so. “Or perhaps little Arya. With all her mischief she would make sure the king never slept. I’ve never seen a child with so much energy.”

“You forget you have one of your own.” 

“The king? You want me to marry fat Robert? What is wrong with you? You want me to be queen to the man who laughed at the deaths of your niece and nephew? Have you lost your mind?” Being queen trumped being the Ruling Princess of Dorne but she would never marry the man who she heard laughed at the deaths of her cousins. 

Her father and her uncle both winced at the mention of Rhaenys and Aegon. They had never forgiven it...or so she thought. 

“Or perhaps you mean the whelp he got on the Lannister woman,” she continued. “How can you make me marry the grandson of the man who ordered Elia’s death and that of her children?!” Her fury rose anew. This time she made it as far as the table throwing the board they were playing with to the floor. The pieces fell all over, some breaking. They’d have to speak to her now. 

Her uncle moved, put a chair behind her and ordered her to sit. 

“No!” she spat. “Why do you hate me so, father?” To her fury her tears began to flow again and her voice broke. “Why would you burden me with Robert?” She had never seen him but had heard he was as fat as an aurochs now and drunk the entire time. 

“Arianne!” The voice belonged to her uncle. “Be quiet and sit.” 

“No!” she countered scornfully. “Why must you always speak for him? I want _you_ to speak to me father. Why do you hate me?!” 

“Arianne,” her uncle ground out, “Sit! I have neither the forbearance of your father nor his patience. Sit….Now!” 

Arianne flinched. Her uncle hardly ever shouted at her, or any of his family. Her father merely picked up his pieces. The catapults were broken as were two elephants but the rest of his pieces were still whole. His mighty red king with the golden crown was back on the board, as were the dragons, the rabble, more spearmen than she’d ever seen on a board before, the light horse and the heavy horse were all there along with the elephants and the bowmen. 

“I don’t hate you,” her father assured her, his voice soft, and his eyes watery. His regretful tone made her sit. Suddenly the mood in the room shifted, even her uncle’s eyes seemed more kind, less furious and certainly held none of the mirth he shared when he joked about the king’s future wives. 

“I had other plans for you,” he finished. 

That only made her angry again. “Oh, yes,” she said scornfully, “such plans. Gyles Rosby. Blind Ben Beesbury. Greybeard Grandison. They were your plans.” She gave him no chance to reply. “I know it is my duty to provide an heir for Dorne, I have never been forgetful of that. I would have wed, and gladly, but the matches that you brought to me were insults. With every one you spit on me. If you ever felt any love for me at all, why offer me to Walder Frey?” 

“Because I knew that you would spurn him. I had to be seen to try to find a consort for you once you’d reached a certain age, else it would have raised suspicions, but I dared not bring you any man you might accept. You were promised, Arianne.” 

Promised? Arianne stared at him incredulously. “What are you saying? Is this another lie? You never said …”

“I was waiting for the right time. When you were old enough and the time was right.” 

““I am three-and-twenty, for seven years a woman grown.” 

“I know. If I kept you ignorant too long, it was only to protect you.” His tone was full of exhaustion. 

Her uncle took over for him. “It was to protect you, Arianne. You are still young as are your cousins. To you, a secret is only a choice tale to whisper to those you love and who knows who will whisper to who until the secret is out and cannot be contained. The time has come however, for you to know.” He smiled again, “I suppose you can’t tell anyone new in the middle of the sea.” 

Arianne didn’t find it funny. She was lost, confused. _Promised. I was promised._ “Who is it? Who have I been betrothed to, all these years?”

“You will meet him well enough in Norvos.” 

“Norvos?” Arianne did not think she could get any more confounded than she was. “What is there in Norvos for me?” 

Her uncle Oberyn picked up a sword from behind him. One of the largest Arianne had ever seen. Her uncle pulled it out of its scabbard. The blade was as pale as milkglass. _Dawn._ She knew the sword. She had visited Starfall enough times to gaze upon it. _It was all Darkstar coveted._

Her mind was lost in an even more surging perplexity. “Why do you have Dawn?” 

Her uncle smiled, placing it back in its holder. “You will return it to its owner and meet your betrothed there. Perhaps, then you’ll be _his_ headache and not ours. Perhaps you might learn what it takes to be a queen.” 

Arianne couldn’t see herself but if she could she imagined she must have looked like a puzzled fish who opened its mouth and closed it, only to try for a word and not find any. 

“What happened to you, little Ari? You had a lot of words to say to your father before…” Her uncle was needling her all while he laughed. 

Her father stood, then crouched in front of her. He took her hands, overturning them so her palms faced him. In one hand he put a king and in the other a red dragon. 

“I promised Quentyn Dorne, because you, my dear one, are destined for greater than the Seat of the Sun. You will be queen….not Robert’s” he added when he saw her furrowed brow. He pushed his thumb upwards to rid her of the crease there. “Or any of his spawn. You will be the queen they didn’t allow Elia to become.” 

“Who, father? Who is this king?” 

Her father smiled. “Your aunt’s son.”

“Aegon is dead!” 

“Is he?” her uncle drawled. “Since when?” 

He was playing with her and just when she thought she couldn’t spiral any further in confusion she had. “Aegon is dead...everyone knows that.” Her voice sounded unsure even to herself. 

“I assure you the boy is not,” her uncle laughed. 

“He is in Norvos,” her father added. “We have seen to it that he is educated in all that a prince requires. He has travelled throughout the Free Cities and learnt humility that Robert never has and...he will treat you well. I hear he is grown to be a good man.” 

“Being raised by men who place honour above getting a good fuck will do that to a man.” Her uncle was never one to remain silent for too long. 

“I…” Arianne was lost for words. Regret was beginning to wash over her. The moment their words sunk in she realised she had misinterpreted every one of her father’s actions, his words, all his treatment of her. He made her read those books and study that drab history... _because he means for me to be queen._ Her heart was breaking, she could feel it as she did so. She threw her arms around her father.

“Father, I’m sorry!” Her breath came out in shaky rasps. She ran away to marry a man who she hoped would raise an army against him. “Father, I didn’t know. I-” 

“I know, dear one,” he said, wiping her tears, still on bended knee. “But remember, Arianne, words are like arrows. Once loosed, you cannot call them back. Learn from this, dear one.” 

“I promise,” she replied, kissing his forehead and his cheeks and every part of his face she could find. Her heart was still breaking, but a good breaking, the kind that would lead to healing. “I just, I...He’s Aegon!” she realised out loud. “Aegon Sand. That’s why you only took him north. To Aunt Elia.” 

“Well, I guess she has some smarts about her,” her uncle laughed, peeling a ripe blood orange. 

“Why did you wait so long?” 

“Your aunt Elia once told us something about blood oranges,” her uncle said in a dead-pan voice. Her father started laughing. Arianne didn’t understand. 

“Arianne,” her father said, “It is an easy thing for a prince to call the spears, but in the end the children pay the price. For their sake, the wise prince will wage no war without good cause, nor any war he cannot hope to win. Robert won his throne by strength, and he cemented it with the Greyjoy Rebellion. Chipping that away takes time and patience and Aegon was a squawling babe when he was ripped out of Elia’s arms to safety.”

“But...the baby. The one Robert laughed at.”

“Was a poor child for who will find justice. It takes time for a babe to become a king that people will follow and I have been hard on you, dear one, to make a queen out of you. One who knows her own laws as well as those of the land she will rule with her husband.” 

A warmth surged through Arianne’s body, and a tear escaped her eye. _He believes in me,_ she sighed. _This is all I wanted._ Her bottom lip quivered and she bit it to make it stop. 

“Now it’s time for you to go, sweet one,” her father said, “when you return it will be as queen.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter begins before the last two and ends before they take place as well. I should probably have written it before theirs but it doesn’t really interact with what takes place in those chapters so...forgive me?  
> I was planning to do Varys but Varys hides his intentions and actions from even me. We'll learn those together.  
> I love Arianne -Westeros’-most-long-suffering-singleton- Martell. I think she is such a lovely human being who just wants her daddy to see her for her and Doran is a man who is spinning lots of plates in secret in the background which leaves her feeling lost, especially when Oberyn is in the background treating his own daughters like queens. But the moment Arianne realises just what her father is doing in the shadows, she begins to step into Oberyn’s place beside him.  
> In this world, he’s still offering her  
> betrothal options that affect her self esteem, poor girl but is taking closer interest in her education. For a young girl who can’t see the big picture of course, that’s not really useful esp if she feels Doran is paying more attention to having powerful connections through his sons’ marriages.  
> Shout out to Chaotic Otter for the advice on what people with gout should eat. I couldn’t include the science in here but grumpy Doran eating less appetising foods definitely made it in lmao.  
> Doran playing with the red dragon is an intentional choice lol. In the book when he has the Justice, Vengeance, Fire & Blood conversation with her he’s playing with a black dragon (the symbol of House Blackfyre) despite Quentyn going to find Dany (a Targaryen and therefore a red dragon). Of course in this story our boy is the real deal hence the red dragon. Isn’t GRRM just a genius?  
> Regarding the Arianne/Egg match. I know there are better matches. Elia, at the time, was working with what she had. Norvos is rich & she needed someone to begin bankrolling her son’s safety ASAP. She could have technically made connections with the Tyrells but they’d just bent the knee in front of her to Robert. Remember she was at Storm’s End and was questioning who to trust in the aftermath of the most traumatic of events. If she can’t trust knowledge of Egg with Ned who she *knows* is hiding a Targaryen under his roof, I’m not sure she’d trust a Tyrell, even if they fought until the last minute...well feasted. I know, Ned is linked with Robert and Mace wasn’t but Ned, at that time, had broken ties with Robert in front of her and she still didn’t trust him. Ned also didn’t have daughters when she made the on the spot decision.  
> As for Arya/Jon...please we are expecting too much from our Targlings. They’re Rhaegar’s sons remember and the generation before their grandfather all married for love (I know they also ruined their legacy lmao) but you know, let’s give our reckless Targs a little space lmao.  
> I think the next chapter is another Arianne, followed by an Aegon and then hopefully we’re back to Winterfell, though who knows another character may demand attention.  
> Side note, I totally think Sansa would react like that to Nedshara because even when Littlefinger spins his tales about her mother and him, Sansa accepts the story while Arya is ready to duel Ned Dayne for her father's honour hahaha. Wouldn't it be a shame if Arya met Ashara *sharpens knife*


	14. Arianne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is 100% a filler - I'm in a bit of a writing funk and have been enjoying reading more than writing this week but if I didn't write something then I could easily fall out of the flow. The next chapter will focus on Aegon then we're off to Winterfell.

**Arianne**

_“_ _It is an easy thing for a prince to call the spears, but in the end the children pay the price. For their sake, the wise prince will wage no war without good cause, nor any war he cannot hope to win. Robert won his throne by strength, and he cemented it with the Greyjoy Rebellion. Chipping that away takes time and patience.”_ Doran Martell’s words replayed in her mind. Her father was a man of few words.. _.and few actions_ she would have said just a little while ago but in that short exchange of words with her father and her uncle upon the ship that had been her home for nigh on a fortnight she knew how much she had misjudged him. 

_“Now it’s time for you to go, sweet one, when you return it will be as queen.”_ Her father had believed in her, even though he never once told her just how much he did. He meant to make her a queen when she was a child splashing in the pools of the Water Gardens. He had overseen her education, locking her away with Maester Calleote reading tomes as dry as bone while her cousins rode and fought and did all the things she couldn’t do. Arianne had never understood why he was so hard on her. It was not like he was going to leave Sunspear to her. _He was going to give me something more._

She thought so often of her aunt Elia. When she was a child, after Elia had lost her babes, she retired from Sunspear for the Water Gardens to watch them play in the pools. More oft than not she would do so with tears in her eyes. _Probably remembering her daughter._ Once, Sarella had come to them saying she saw their aunt weeping. They were all too small to understand most things in the world but they knew, even then, of Aegon and Rhaenys’ deaths and how heavily the loss weighed on their aunt. So the five of them, Arianne, Obara, Tyene, Nymeria and Sarella decided to sing for her. They were ridiculous of course. Obara couldn’t hold a tune even if you paid her, Sarella did not know the words, Nymeria wanted to sing all the important parts herself and Tyene would not stop giggling which only made Arianne join in. But it worked. They cheered up their aunt and she kissed each one of them, wrapping her arms around them all, laughing where she had been crying just before. 

Her aunt had chosen _her_ for her son when according to her own father he thought Mace Tyrell’s armies would be of more help to Aegon’s cause. _She wanted me to be queen…_

Suddenly, Arianne felt mortified. Her aunt was pulling her own husband into an empty alcove during her last visit when she found Arianne stealing kisses from Daemon Sand before the stupid fool went to her father to ask for her hand. Elia had only laughed at them _but she must have been disappointed…_

Things had not been the same between her and Daemon after his failed proposal anyway. Her father had refused him and though he was still amiable enough, they were not as close as before. If she heard correctly he found fulfilment elsewhere though no one spoke of him and Oberyn where either of them could hear. Her uncle was less restrained in where he found his pleasure but Daemon was a knight now and perhaps wanted to keep some things to himself. 

_Perhaps Aunt Elia is not disappointed in me,_ she told herself. She had travelled north with her _after_ the whole Daemon Sand debacle and her aunt had never mentioned it again. Her aunt taught her about northern houses and customs as if she were born to the North and not Dorne, she had told her stories about her time in the Red Keep and how having Uncle Lewyn there meant the world to her. Arianne remembered Uncle Lewyn. He used to tickle her breathless whenever he came to visit. _And Aunt Elia said he had a paramour...Perhaps she didn’t judge me too harshly because of that...people shared their love generously in Dorne...well everyone but my father...I didn’t know._ She wanted to tell her aunt that she would never search for another’s company now that she was betrothed. 

_Betrothed,_ the word felt funny in her mouth. She had been searching for and rejecting proposals for the best part of her womanhood and now she was betrothed. To a future king no less, if her father was to be believed. And she did believe him. Doran Martell was many things but a rash liar was not one of them. If he said something would happen then it often did. 

Arianne spent many a day and night on her journey wondering what this prince of hers might look like. Her uncle Oberyn had said he had Rhaegar’s eyes and hair but he was of a broader build and had the colouring of a lighter salty Dornishman. Arianne could not imagine a man more handsome, even if she hadn’t actually seen him. Everyday, Arianne let her imagination drift up to the clouds as if the images she drew in her mind were kites gliding upward, dancing with the birds in the day, bobbing and gliding through the stars in the night sky. In her mind’s eye he was always handsome. She had plenty of time to imagine what he might look like. 

Her father had sent her off with Tyene, for which Arianne could not be more grateful, Drey had joined her too and Garin. Only Spotted Sylva was missing of her friends. With Quentyn with Lord Yronwood, and Trystane too young, it had always been her and Tyene, with Garin and Drey and Spotted Sylva. Nym would sometimes join them, and Sarella was forever pushing in where she didn’t belong, but for the most part they had been a company of five. They had shared dreams and secrets as children, cheered each other up and faced their fears together. Tyene and Arianne were even going to share Drey as their first man...had he not have gotten too excited. If there were any people she would have wanted by her side now, it would be them.

“You’re thinking about him again,” Tyene said sleepily. They were sharing a cabin. The two of them had been bedmates since they were children. “Do you think he’s even more handsome than Darkstar?”

Arianne sighed. “Go to sleep.”

Tyene only shifted on her pillow. “I think he is. He is Rhaegar’s son and they say Rhaegar turned the heads of both men _and_ women.”

“Rhaegar also ran away with the Stark girl.” Arianne turned to her cousin in the dark. “I wonder if he takes after his father in such fancies.” 

“Let’s hope he doesn’t,” Tyene said innocently, “A septa’s daughter becoming a kinslayer is a most _terrible_ fate to imagine.” 

Arianne snuggled against her, comforted at her words but also terrorised. There was no knowing when Tyene was joking about such things. _I hope he has more sense than his father,_ she thought. _If he doesn’t we’d all have hell to pay for it._

—

“When do you think we can return?” Tyene asked in her sweet voice. She was sitting on Drey’s lap sewing with her golden needle.Drey’s arms enveloped her. The two of them had reverted to the companionship of their childhood. 

“I don’t know.” 

“Our Ari will be queen…”  
“And blood will come to Westeros,” Garin confirmed.

“ _Fire_ and Blood,” Drey corrected, raising a finger. 

That worried her. Dorne had risen with Aerys against Robert before and lost. Since then, Robert’s hold on the Iron Throne and Westeros had only grown. When the Greyjoys rose against him, every kingdom, bar Dorne, sent him men. He’d been on the Iron Throne for sixteen years and never had a stronger grip on the throne. How were they to overthrow him for Aegon?

“That is not the only thing that worries me,” Arianne said, finally finding her voice. “We’ll be alone. With me as a bride, Aegon only has Dorne.” She left _Dorne cannot stand alone_ unsaid. It was heard all the same judging by Garin and Drey’s downcast looks. 

_Father would not go into a war he could not win,_ she comforted herself but what her father was planning she didn’t know. War was always bloody and right now her betrothed only had Dorne. 

“Let them come,” Tyene said boastfully, “when they do we’ll bleed them in the passes and bury them beneath the blowing sands, as we have a hundred times before. Then we’ll only wait and try again. Even their famed Young Dragon’s conquest only lasted half a summer before he too fell to us. I’d be pleased with felling a lion or two for what they did to Aunt Elia and poor Rhaenys.” 

“It’s not about felling lions though, Tyene. It’s about putting Aegon on his ancestors’ throne.” Dorne’s faithful service to the Iron Throne after they joined the realm under King Daeron the Good was why King Aerys rewarded Dorne with Aunt Elia’s marriage to Rhaegar. Dorne had stood with House Targaryen against the Blackfyre Pretenders, sending spears to fight the Ninepenny Kings on the Stepstones.

“Perhaps Dorne is not alone,” Drey added. “Princess Elia has been in the north for most of Robert’s reign _and_ Lord Stark stood with her against Robert before.” 

“He left his court,” Arianne corrected, “He did not battle against him for her.” 

“He left because of Aegon’s murder. Perhaps he’ll stand with him if he returns. The throne _is_ his by right.” 

“The Targaryens lost it by right of conquest.”

“But Robert only consolidated his hold because he was in line for the throne after Prince Viserys.” 

Viserys. Stories had reached them of how the Mad King’s young son was spirited away before Stannis captured Dragonstone but no one had heard a peep about him since then. 

Arianne stared at the ceiling. Dread mounted in her body about the seemingly insurmountable odds that awaited them. There were so many questions she had for her father, so many she had not yet asked; prime of which was why was he so confident that they could win?

She shut her eyes, and moved toward the small window of the cabin. Before she could reach it she stumbled against an object. _Dawn._ The greatsword had not left her sight since they began their journey. She had often unsheathed it looking it over. All over Westeros, not just in Dorne, boys dreamt of being a son of Starfall so they might claim the sword and its title. It had been what Darkstar coveted most. “ _You will return it to its owner,”_ her uncle said but no one had wielded Dawn since the death of Ser Arthur Dayne.

Everyone knew the story, Lord Stark had killed Ser Arthur Dayne to reach his sister, Lady Lyanna Stark, in the Tower of Joy. Arianne had once seen the cairns on the Prince’s Pass herself on a trip to The Reach and her uncle Oberyn had told the story of how Lord Stark returned the sword to Ashara Dayne as a sign of respect countless times. Her aunt Elia had been there as well. And everyone knew how Ashara flung herself into the sea when the man she loved killed her brother. 

“Drey,” Arianne called out to her friend. He looked up from nuzzling the giggling Tyene’s neck, “Who was the Sword of the Morning before Ser Arthur?” 

“Ser Davos Dayne. He died half a century ago at least. He died even before Ser Arthur was born. Why?” 

Arianne looked once more at the sword. Dawn was not like other ancestral swords. It did not pass from lord to heir and so on. Only a son of House Dayne seen as worthy of its title could wield it. She began laughing until her friends looked at her as if she were mad. The only other Daynes alive now were Allyria and Ned and Ned was off squiring with Allyria’s betrothed. 

“I believe we will be meeting more than one ghost,” she reflected. For some reason the thought comforted her. It felt like cold water poured over the hot coals of worry that burnt inside her chest. _If Ser Arthur Dayne is alive then that means Ned Stark not only knows but kept up the lie…_ And if Ser Arthur were alive there was every chance Ser Oswell Whent and Ser Gerold Hightower were alive as well. Perhaps Drey was right. Perhaps Lord Stark would stand with them for Aegon, the boy he could not save. Her aunt trusted Lord Stark explicitly and her uncle Oberyn who hated all associated with Robert and the Lannisters who propped him up had a begrudging respect for the man who saved his sister from being raped and murdered. 

Her father’s confidence that she would return a queen began to make more sense. Lord Stark had ties to the Riverlands and the Vale and was known across the kingdoms for his honour, valor and, she learnt in her time in the north, for his justice. Him siding with Aegon could win them more men. The North for sure and his wife’s kin in the Riverlands and perhaps even the Vale. Arianne was not so sure about the third kingdom though. Lord Arryn was Robert’s Hand. She did not know enough about the court in King’s Landing to know who Lord Arryn would side with if his two foster sons went to war against each other but Aunt Elia’s insistence to live in the north _would_ make more sense if Lord Stark had been planning for Aegon’s return as well. _Wheels within wheels,_ Arianne thought. But there were many more wheels she _couldn’t_ make sense of like why Lord Stark refused to betroth Arya to Trystane if he was already planning for Aegon’s return. _The marriage would make our families even closer._

Their ship had brought them as far as Pentos where they were met by one of the fattest men Arianne had ever seen. 

“Ah,” he said wondrously, when he first saw her step off the ship in Pentos, bowing as far as his knees would allow, “You are as radiant as the sun, my princess.” 

Arianne shared a look with Tyene who left her hands inside her sleeves. Tyene was most dangerous when suspicious and unpredictable when cornered. Drey put his hand on his sword. A foolish action but ever so gallant. They were outnumbered even with their guards. 

“I am sorry, my lord,” Arianne said, clutching Dawn against her chest - why she could not say, Arianne was no warrior but she promised to return it to its owner. “I do not know you..” Judging from his silks and his guards, he was clearly a man of some import. 

“Illyrio Mopatis, Princess. Magister of Pentos.” He bowed again. “I believe we share quite a few friends, including,” he whispered moving closer, “the Rightful King of Westeros and your betrothed. I was bid to expect you by your uncle and Father.” 

“Well met, my lord,” Arianne said, inclining her head.

“And you, my future queen.” He bowed once more before they were guided to his manse. _Future queen,_ the words felt foreign to Arianne. 

As if he could hear her thoughts, Garin mimicked the fat lord once they disembarked from the litter upon their arrival to the Magister’s manse. He bowed and declared, “My future queen, it is I, Gay Garin of the Greenblood at your service.” He fell into a fit of chuckles. She could not help but join in. For all that she was a princess of Dorne, he’d been mocking her since they shared his mother’s breast as children. 

Drey loomed over her, keeping his eyes on everyone around them. 

Before they supped with the magister, Bellandra bathed her, adorning her in Dornish silks and combing her hair until it glistened. _Though nothing in this overstated manse glitters as greatly as the fat man’s moustachio._

“I have had the pleasure of hosting His Grace, when he was just a babe,” he announced over their rich supper, “And I have had the pleasure of hosting him many times since, often with your uncle.”

“Why?” she asked finally, putting to words what she had been wondering since he met them at the docks. “Why does a Magister of Pentos care about who sits on the Iron Throne?” She added a smile to temper the harshness of her words. She had an uneasy feeling about this overly generous magister. 

He licked his fingers dry and dabbed the grease from his lips with a napkin. “I am an old man, grown weary of this world and its treacheries. Is it so strange that I should wish to do some good before my days are done...to help a rightful king regain his birthright?” He smiled at her as he said so showing his crooked yellow teeth. It was supposed to be a comforting smile but with all his chins, he only looked pained. 

Arianne returned his smile. “Robert sits comfortably upon his throne. Surely you have more to risk harboring such a man when you could grow rich from handing him over...for the right price.” 

He chuckled at that, each of his chins bounced as he did. “King Aegon’s life was entrusted to me by an old friend and I would not betray that trust.” Arianne wasn’t sure that was all there was more to it but to pry further would be rude. 

Two days later they set off to begin their crossing of Andalos, the land from which the Andals hailed. Though the magister was keen to point out that the Pentoshi called these lands the Flatlands. Septa Lemore had once taught them that the Seven themselves had once walked the hills of Andalos in human form. “The Father reached his hand into the heavens and pulled down seven stars,” she once said, “and one by one he set them on the brow of Hugor of the Hill to make a glowing crown for the first King of the Andals. The Maid brought him forth a girl as supple as a willow with eyes like deep blue pools, and Hugor declared that he would have her for his bride. So the Mother made her fertile, and the Crone foretold that she would bear the king four-and-forty mighty sons. The Warrior gave strength to their arms, whilst the Smith wrought for each a suit of iron plates.” As they made their way through this ancient land of deities to her own King of the Andals, Arianne hoped that she and their union too would be blessed as Hugor’s and his bride’s. The Seven had promised Hugor and his descendants great kingdoms in a foreign land. _And they had granted it,_ she thought. She hoped her own prince.. _.king..._ too would return triumphantly to his kingdom. 

It was difficult to imagine this land being the land of gods. All they saw were ruins and tillers and toilers bound to the land. Every now and then the Magister would point out his own orchards and farms and mines. 

“Why are there no towns?” Arianne asked him. The land was bare but for the people that toiled it. _No wonder they call it the Flat Lands._

“The Dothraki horse lords often make their way through these lands, princess. We pay them well to leave the fields but should they attack...orchards alone can be sacrificed while we are safe behind our city walls. The Dothraki are not so fond of cities behind walls...or the sea,” he told her. Throughout the journey, the magister only stopped eating on only four occasions: to talk, to drink, to piss - he pissed every half an hour - and to sleep. He snored when he did so but Arianne had to be courteous. The ride through Andalos was long and she wanted to know as much about her betrothed before she met him. 

“He is a sweet lad,” the Magister said when she asked about him, “I last saw him two summers ago when he went to visit Westeros with Princess Elia.” 

“During the false spring.” 

“Aye. He’s a fearsome swordsman, but kind, honourable...”

 _Handsome?_ Arianne wanted to ask but she would settle for a fearsome warrior who was kind. She had always found wonder in dangerous men. Once her uncle had taken them to the ruins of Sandyshore. He caught some vipers and showed Tyene the safest way to milk them for their venom. Sarella turned over rocks, brushed sand off the mosaics, and wanted to know everything there was to know about the people who had lived here and Arianne sat beside the well and pretended that some robber knight had brought her there to have his way with her...a tall hard man with black eyes and a widow’s peak. And ever since then she had her way with dangerous men. _Daemon, Gerold...Perhaps Aegon will be my last._

The Magister took them as far as the Velvet Hills and Ghoyan Drohe where he offered them two options: to sail down Mother Rhoyne and up her tributary of the Noyne or to ride up to the Hills of Norvos. From the hopeful look Garin had thrown her, they decided for the former. The orphans of the Greenblood were of pure Rhoynish blood and of the people of Queen Nymeria who lamented the burning of the ships. To this day they plied their poleboats along the Greenblood dreaming of the day they could return to Mother Rhoyne. She could not begrudge her friend a longer journey on the river of their motherland. The only reason they stopped at Pentos and not Volantis to sail up the Rhoyne all the way to Norvos was because pirates held sway in the stretch of the river between Ar Noy, under Qohorik rule, and the Sorrows, under Volantene control. But Norvoshi river galleys ruled the Noyne as far south as the ruins of Ny Sar where the river met Mother Rhoyne. So that’s where they sailed to upon their parting from the magister.

“I look forward to our next meeting, Princess,” he said at the waterfalls of Ghoyan Drohe. “I hope then, that it will be time for us to sail.” He gave her a bundle of candied ginger, saying that Aegon had always been fond of them. _So am I,_ she thought. 

Garin prayed to both the Crab King and the Old Man of the River who had once set aside their bickering to sing a song to end the Long Night. He prayed to the river as well. In the time of the Rhoynar, it was said the Mother Rhoyne herself whispered to her children of every threat, that the Rhoynar princes wielded strange, uncanny powers, that Rhoynish women fought as fiercely as Rhoynish men, and that their cities were protected by “watery walls” that would rise to drown any foe.

But rising waters meant little against the dragonlords who sacked the Rhoynar’s cities time and again.

“It’s hard to imagine,” said Garin as they sailed past twisted half-drowned trees that reached out like gnarled hands, “that once legends of the Rhoynar sailed these shores.” There was hardly a sight to see beyond ruins on either bank of the river. 

“Like your name-sake?” Tyene needled. 

“Aye, Prince Garin the Great who united the Rhoynar against the dragonlords.” Garin began to narrate his story. “A thousand years ago the dragonlords destroyed Sarhoy, one of the greatest of the Rhoynar cities. They slaughtered the warriors and sent their children off to slavery after burning their city and sowing the ruins with salt so that Sarhoy may never rise again. For many of the previous wars the Rhoynar of each city had fought alone until Prince Garin of Chroyane brought them all together. ‘ _join me_ ’,” he called out theatrically as he pretended to be his namesake, “‘ _to wash away every Valyrian city on the river_.’ Prince Garin the Great won battle after battle until the Valyrians hid behind their city walls….until they struck back not with the three dragons that he faced in previous battles but with three hundred.” He sighed sadly, “They say the fires burned so hot that the waters of the river boiled and turned to steam.” It was hard to imagine that now. The river was busy with turtles swimming gracefully. Some were so large they could have borne a man upon their backs. Rhoynar princes were said to ride them across the river. 

“Prince Garin was carried back to his city in a golden cage and made to watch as his people were enslaved. They sought to break him...but they could not. The prince called down a curse upon the conquerors, entreating Mother Rhoyne to avenge her children. The river flooded and from that day on, greyscale took a hold in the city.” 

They all fell silent at the tale of the Great Rhoynar’s sombre end. Only Princess Nymeria of Ny Sar had the sense to oppose Garin’s plan. Her father had told her the story. ‘ _This is a war we cannot hope to win_ ,’ she warned the princes when they united, but the other princes shouted her down and pledged their swords to Garin. Even the warriors of her own Ny Sar were eager to fight, and Nymeria had no choice but to join the great alliance but when Chroyane fell she gathered every ship that remained upon the Rhoyne, large or small, and filled them full of as many women and children as they could carry for almost all the men of fighting age had marched with Garin, and died. The rest as they say is history. 

They sailed past the ruins of Ny Sar later that day when the poleboat began to leave the Rhoyne for the Noyne. The ruins stretched as far as the eye could see. At the top of the ancient city stood the remains of a colossal palace of pink and green marble, its collapsed domes and broken spires looming large above a row of covered archways. That was all that was left of Nymeria’s city. 

Where in Andalos she prayed for a blessed union, at Ny Sar she prayed for Dorne and Westeros as a whole when war came. She hoped their end would not be like Ny Sar’s. Robert left Pyke standing after the Greyjoy Rebellion. She did not think he would be so gracious this time round. Not against a Targaryen. _Sunspear is not Pyke,_ she told herself. The castle’s winding walls were raised seven hundred years ago and wrapped the castle and the shadow city in a winding curtain that would cause even the boldest enemy to lose their way. Still, she prayed for her home and her people. War was easy to plan on a board, it's reality was much different and though _she_ had never known it first hand, she knew how it hollowed out her aunt. After all, though she found happiness with Lord Glover, no amount of that love could replace the gaping holes left by all that she had lost. Arianne never wanted to experience that or for anyone else to do so. 

Finally, the rolling hills and the white stucco walls of her mother’s homeland came to view. Tears began to well in Bellandra’s eyes. She had not seen her homeland since she travelled to Westeros with Lady Mellario nearly thirty years ago. 

They climbed up the Sinner’s Steps, the massive stone stair that connected the lower city where the smallfolk lived to the Upper City dominated by the temple of the bearded priests and the homes of the rich of Norvos. At the top of those stairs, her betrothed awaited her…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Arianne’s chapters because they’re all: politics-politics-this guy is really handsome-politics-Quentyn is a loser-politics-but he’s my brother-politics-wow this guy is really hot-more politics. 
> 
> *Arianne gets locked up for nearly starting a war.* She totally regrets what happened but is totally *sigh* “I hope my rescuer is hot.” 
> 
> I wanted this chapter to be so much longer but I'm just not feeling writing at the moment. Half this chapter is backstory - I bought a copy of a World of Ice and Fire recently and couldn't help including bits and pieces in here. 
> 
> We'll cover the major bits I planned for this chapter in Egg's which I'll publish hopefully during the week but more probably next weekend. In the meantime, I'm off to read some more historical fiction xx


	15. Aegon

**Aegon**

  
Aegon couldn’t breathe. The pillow was heavy above him and Viserys heavier on his chest. 

“You are no true dragon,” Viserys sniped, eager not to be heard by the guards outside. “You are no dragon but I am and I will not be usurped.” 

_Please Viserys,_ Aegon wanted to say. _It is me. Your nephew. I am not usurping you._ No voice would come out. _Viserys please,_ he wanted to say to the man, the monster, that sat on his chest, trying to force out all the air in his lungs.

Aegon heard the hissing of a viper before all went silent. 

He jumped with a start. It had been moonturns since he last dreamt of Viserys. The boy who had been his uncle...the one who regaled him with stories of Westeros, the one who Egg loved and wanted to be like, turned into a resentful man who blamed Egg, and his mother, for all that befell House Targaryen. “If your rag of a mother was half a woman, Rhaegar would never have looked at the Stark whore,” he’d gripe. “You are traitor’s spawn. My father said it. The Dornish betrayed Rhaegar at The Trident. My father, the king, said I was his heir. Not you. The Iron Throne shreds traitors as well as any sword. Do not dream of it.” 

A barbed bolt of lightning came to ground suddenly in the manse’s courtyard. Egg moved to shut the drapery. There were scant few hours before dawn and he wanted to try for some sleep. He stared into the darkness as the tempest raged outside. It was as if he was glimpsing into Viserys’ very soul, finding nothing but a darkness as cavernous and as boundless as the night. 

Egg opened the window and leaned over, taking in the cool night air, and the rain with all its purity. _The_ _worst is over,_ he told himself. Day always followed night and the sun prises through the clouds even after the worst of storms. _All is not lost_. 

It had been a year since Viserys died. Ever since they were children, the two of them were seldom left alone with one another. Viserys had a wild temper susceptible to changing moods as quick as a flash and as wild as the storm that raged outside. None of their household was untouched by his rage. As he grew older, bolder, he began to subject all to his ire. Lord Commander Ser Gerold who’d fought more battles than hairs on Viserys’ thin, scraggly beard did not escape him, nor did Ser Oswell, Rhaegar’s secret keeper or Ser Arthur, his best friend and the most formidable of the Kingsguard. Even Septa Lemore and Ashara and Haldon found no respite from him. But none was the subject of his cruelty more than Egg. He targeted him because he was younger than him, because he was Rhaegar’s heir and the usurped king and because he was the one that the Kingsguard saved. When Dragonstone fell, Viserys only had Ser Willem Darry and a handful of guards, none of them of the Kingsguard. He resented Aegon for something that was not his fault. He had not sent them to himself.

The only person to escape his fury was Ser Willem, the man to whom he held any gratitude. “My father was not mad,” he snapped once at Prince Oberyn, “if he were, he would have taken on Tygett Lannister as master-at-arms as Tywin Lannister wanted instead of Ser Willem. If he’d done that, I would have been as dead as Rhaenys!” Ser Willem died years ago and Viserys only got worse. 

More than once he attacked Aegon in word and deed. When he was a child the Kingsguard would physically restrain Viserys from harming him, their vows were to protect the king and he was their king according to the laws of the realm. Though Viserys maintained that he was heir. As he grew older, Aegon grew to have more prowess with a sword and grew stronger than Viserys. Which is why for an entire year before the incident, Viserys had not raised a blade against him, nor did he jibe against him once. For a year he had been the perfect companion, studying with him, hunting with him and travelling through the Free Cities with him. They had just returned from Pentos together, two blue-haired brothers and their family. The two of them had taken to sharing quarters while on the road, so upon their return to the Norvoshi manse in the hills, Egg did not consider it too dubious a matter when Viserys came to his chambers, drink in hand to entertain him with tales of his exploits in Lys. Viserys was unencumbered by a betrothal, they wanted to save any alliances that he might win for them upon their return to Westeros. Aegon had always known that he was betrothed to his cousin and did not want to dishonour his betrothal by lying with another.. _.and Septa Lemore would have me take a fast of repentance until I died. And that’s only if my mother hadn’t killed me for her niece ...the bride I’ve never met._

That night Egg told Viserys of how he wanted to go beyond the Bone Mountains to see the plains of the Jhogo Nai and Yi Ti. “Lomas Longstrider said the cities of Yi Ti are much larger and more splendid than cities in the west!”

“Lomas Longstrider is most likely a liar and a grandstander.” 

“He saw more of the world than any man alive.” Aegon was sure the world still contained wonders more soul-stirring than any he’d yet beheld. Not many kings were afforded the chance to know the world before duty befell them. Sometimes Egg thought that day would never come. 

“Lomas Longstrider did not take a Dornish princess to bride,” Viserys pointed out. “He was a scribe, not a king. Scribes can do as they please, kings can not.” _Would that I could,_ Egg thought. 

One moment they had been laughing and drinking together and the next Egg awoke to a heavy weight bearing down on his chest. His ribs heaved up and down but no air entered his lungs, compressed as they were by Viserys’ weight. A dizziness overcame him. His hands flailed about seeking any orifice he could exploit but Viserys had chosen his position carefully. In scant minutes Aegon would be dead from the lack of air. His sounds were muffled by the pillow as well. He reached out, trying to find an orifice to exploit. His mouth...his nose...Aegon found the wetness of his eyes and pushed, finding an opening to sit up and overpower his uncle. Ser Gerold who was outside the room had heard nothing - how could he? The pillow smothered his sounds. 

Unfortunately for Viserys he had picked the worst time possible to try and kill Egg. Prince Oberyn arrived the next morning. By nightfall, Aegon stood over Viserys on his deathbed, staring at his weary eyes - eyes that in colour were not unlike his own. Despite all his past cruelty, in that state, as he rasped for air surrounded by no one who truly loved him, Aegon almost pitied him. 

“You shouldn’t have done that uncle,” Aegon whispered sullenly when they left the room. “Don’t deny it,” he added wearily, when his uncle gave him a look of incredulity that melted away to a smirk as he said those words. “I could have sent him to the Wall when I took my throne.” _I did not want to have his death on my conscience._

His uncle let out a huff of laughter and put a hand around his shoulder. “Have they ever told you about your grandfather?” 

Aegon knew they called him the Mad King now, and he heard many tales of regret and circumspection from his father’s men about the conduct of King Aerys II.

“Return with a man as wild as the Mad King and you will win no men to your cause, Aegon. We would never get justice for you or your sister. No sane man would follow the Mad King reborn. He sought to kill you as a child and lived to become a man who sought to kill you again. They” he said, motioning his head at Ser Gerold and Ser Oswell, “are sworn to protect the king and do no harm to his family. My duty is only to you, my sister’s son. If I let him live, he’d only try to do you harm again. I won’t weep for him. Nor should you.”

While Egg did not weep for the cruel man that Viserys had become, he did miss the companion he had for that year, and the boy that he was before. He was surrounded by people who loved him but none were close to him in age. Still, no burden weighed as heavily on him than the doubts Viserys had left behind. You are no true king, he’d say. “No one would rise for you. Your little Dornish whore will give you no more than forty thousand men, if that. _I_ am free to find allies of my own and men at court still know me. Lords Rowan, Tyrell and Redwyne fought until the last moment for my father. They would rise for me were I to take a daughter of theirs to bride. Remember that well, _Dornishman_.” He always said that word as if it were a slur. 

That weighed heavily on Egg. His mother remained hopeful and his uncle even more so but how would men come under his banners if they did not know him? Was the memory of Rhaegar enough? The father Aegon got to know from the stories of his friends was different to the tales he heard in Westeros...in the North, where he’d visited his mother two years past, Rhaegar was a rapist who’d stolen Lyanna Stark and held her against her will until she died. Hearing of his father spoken like that felt like a shard in his guts. His mother said the truth was often found in the middle. “Your father had faults,” she told him once when he’d sulked away, “and as king you’ll have to be able to admit to the faults of the past if you want to heal Westeros’ wounds.” 

“Do you hate him?” he asked.

She only laughed. “No. Rhaegar was not perfect but he was a better man that Robert Baratheon will ever be. Whatever his faults, he loved you and I know he wanted no harm to befall me. Everything that happened to our family happened because of the Aerys. Not Rhaegar.” For a while she stared into the distance, “Rhaegar’s biggest fault was that he had a chance to correct things and he didn’t. Perhaps…” she sighed tiredly, “Perhaps, he missed his chance to right his wrongs...or perhaps Robert didn’t let him live long enough to do so.” 

“And Lyanna?” Aegon asked. 

They were riding out in the Wolfswood together. “I felt slighted,when he crowned her at Harrenhal,” she said honestly, sadly. “Perhaps even a little jealous. She was a beautiful girl but a child nonetheless...your grandfather was said to have many mistresses and many lords did. My own uncle who’d taken a vow of celibacy had a bloody paramour. I would be lying if I said I hadn’t expected another woman. But all the anger and rancour I felt melted away as I watched her weep against her brother. I don’t want to die, she cried. How could I hate a scared child who’d lived as much, if not more, grief in a single year than I had in my six-and-twenty?” 

“I will never slight Arianne,” he vowed. 

“Have you been thinking about her lately?” His mother’s laugh was sweet and her cocked eyebrow amused. 

“Tell me about her again.” 

Finally, there was a respite from the storm and the greying sky suggested dawn was not too far behind. Perhaps he’d get some rest before the new day dawned. 

They were breaking their fast when Lemore returned from her morning bath, long wet hair dripping behind her. Ser Oswell whistled the moment she walked in the room.

The septa raised an eyebrow.

“Don’t mind me,” he shrugged. “I am only admiring the beauty that is your creation.”

“Admire is all you can do,” Ashara pointed out from where she sat, “such are the vows you have both sworn.” 

“I swore to take no wife and father no children,” Ser Oswell corrected her when he put down his bread. “A better brother than I said, more than once I may add, that it was the sword in a man’s hand that determined his worth, not the one between his legs. The sword in my hand belongs to His Grace. But,” he added, facing Lemore who sat beside him, buttering her bread, “the one between my legs could be yours fair septa...alongside my heart of course.” 

“I would remind you of Ser Terrence Toyne’s end,” Haldon reminded him. 

“Ser Terrence Toyne bedded the mistress of the king. I only confess my love to the most beautiful of septas.” 

“I believe you should pray those thoughts away, Ser.” 

“Perhaps we should pray together,” he winked before turning to Ashara, “As for you,” he said, “you should know what they say about glass houses. You might as well be a septa yourself.” 

Ser Arthur put down his cup to look at his brother. 

“I’m just stating facts.” 

Unaware of their silent exchange Haldon said, “I’m only a half maester. I am under no such vows of celibacy.” At Ser Arthur’s glare he added, “Of course I would never say that to you, my lady, because I’d rather not die on Ser Arthur’s sword. If you’ll excuse me, I have some...books to read.” Egg watched the entire exchange with amusement. Ser Arthur began laughing the moment Haldon walked out. 

The rest of the morning went on as it usually did. Egg studied with Haldon, prayed with Lemore and practiced with each of the Kingsguard in turn. Ser Oswell was an expert in the use of a mace and longaxe, weapons he’d need to master to build his strength and ability to overwhelm those he charged. Ser Arthur was the greatest sword in Westeros and Ser Gerold was the greatest lance and rider.

When they’d finish the sparring for that morning, they sat to tell him stories of the Westeros he had never lived to see. _The Westeros that I would have, were it not for the usurper._

“Barristan unhorsed me at that tourney,” Oswell laughed. “Then he took me for a drink right after...I miss him,” he added sadly. 

“Me too,” sighed Ser Gerold. 

Egg had never met the storied knight. He heard so many stories of how he’d entered the lists as a mystery knight because he was too young to compete. He heard of how he slayed the last of the Blackfyre Pretenders as a young knight under the young Ser Gerold’s command when Lord Ormund Baratheon fell in battle. He heard how he fought under Ser Arthur’s command against the Kingswood Brotherhood. “He is sworn to the usurper,” Aegon voiced.

“Aye.” said Ser Gerold sadly. “But I can swear on all that is holy, that it is because he does not know of your existence, Your Grace. He was the only survivor of our brotherhood at The Trident. I do not doubt that he would have died for Rhaegar. There is little Barristan would not do for his king. When Lord Darklyn seized King Aerys, all any of us could do was wait for the attack on the walls to begin. Tywin Lannister sent for his bards to sing the Rains of Castamere, we readied for an attack, Tywin readied himself to crown Rhaegar who he called the better king. Barristan simply asked for a day. In that day, he promised, he’d rescue his king or die in the process.”

“Every one of us thought him mad,” laughed Oswell, “but courage is the brother of madness and Barristan possessed it in buckets.” 

“He scaled the walls of the Dunfort, unseen in the night using nothing but his hands, disguised as a hooded beggar. He killed a guard on the wall before he could raise the alarm and found his way to the king. When the alarm was raised, he avenged Ser Gwayne Gaunt when he killed Ser Symon Hollard. He fought and killed every guard that tried to stop them, putting the king on a horse and riding out before the castle gates could be closed.” 

“Not to mention a wild ride through the streets of Duskendale and a race up the walls all while horns blazed sounding the alarm and Tywin Lannister’s archers rained arrows at the city’s walls to clear it of defenders.” 

“When you return, Your Grace,” Ser Gerold said with conviction, “Barristan’s knee will be the first to bend. I know that as well as I know that day always follows night.” 

Aegon was always struck by the loyalty the Kingsguard had for each other. They spoke of each other as brothers and acted as such with deep bonds tying them to one another through the decades. It had been seventeen years since they had last seen any of Westeros bar the North on the two occasions Egg visited his mother. The only brother that love did not extend to was Jaime Lannister, son of the man who ordered Rhaenys’ death. _Kingslayer_ , they called him. _Oathbreaker. Man without honour._ “Would that I had not knighted him,” Ser Arthur said. “And I not have given him the white cloak,” Ser Gerold would add, though that was outside of his hands. Aerys had commanded that to slight his Hand. 

His mother was not half so harsh. “Hate if you must.” she said, “But make sure you temper it with justice, if not mercy. Your grandfather never paid heed to that lesson. For Lord Darklyn’s wrong against him he executed all the man’s kinsmen: immediate, distant and even his good-kin. He spared only one child by Ser Barristan’s intervention. That hatred only drove him even more mad. Jaime slew a monstrous man, Aegon. A man who just happened to have been his king. Judge him accordingly but never forget the true evil of that day came from the man who ordered the deaths of children to ingratiate himself to the victor.” 

Ashara came walking through the gardens smiling at them. Her eyes danced with mischief. Ashara was still shy of forty, and as beautiful a woman as Egg had ever seen. She had given up her own dreams of a life for herself to raise him in hiding. In his heart she was as much a mother to him as his own. 

“Your bride is coming,” she beamed. “Lady Mellario sent a messenger to say that the Princess arrived a sennight ago and will be arriving here later today.” 

Their manse was isolated in the hills of Norvos, away from the city proper.

For the rest of the morning his focus was scattered, his entire being filled with anticipation...nervousness, perhaps even excitement. Aegon had not known many people from Westeros close to his age. All he had as a child was Viserys. Arianne was supposed to be his life companion. His queen. He wanted to be a better king than his grandfather and a better husband than his father. He’d heard of her beauty from his mother and his uncle. But it was her kindness and humour he preferred to know of more and that he got from his cousin Nymeria and Arya Stark. 

He did not stop over at Winterfell on his last trip with his uncle as his mother had been in residence at her own castle, Deepwood Motte. Oberyn did not want Lord Stark to ask any questions about Egg. Unfortunately for them, Lord Stark was already at Deepwood Motte settling a dispute between the woodsmen of the Wolfswood. Fortunately for them however, Lord Stark did not bat a second look at him beyond a greeting. Viserys had told him the Starks were to blame for all that befell them - his stories of who was the biggest cause of their fall differed, of course, depending on who he hated on that occasion. The Starks, according to Viserys, were scheming barbarians who had never let go of their grudge against the dragonlords for taking their crown away from them. According to Lord Connington they were treacherous rebels never to be trusted. 

Ser Gerold told him, begrudgingly, of the tale of what truly befell Lord Rickard and his son. The rest he learnt from his mother who had witnessed their deaths with her now husband. 

Egg had seen none of what Viserys said of the man his mother said was the reason she was alive. Egg watched Lord Stark pass judgments over trespassing sheep and wandering pigs. He watched him listen with interest as people complained about stolen eggs, and he watched him still as he inspected granaries and storehouses. He had seen none of the man Lord Connington said fell upon him like a storm in the Battle of the Bells or the decisive warrior his mother said had slain the monster who murdered the child she held in his place. All he saw was the man his mother said pursued justice for the deaths of the babes, a man who put his people first and who doted upon the daughter who had travelled with him. He was somewhat disappointed. He did not doubt for a moment that if war came, so many of the people who would stand against him would be just like Lord Stark or perhaps even his mother’s husband. They would not be the villains Viserys wished them to be. That made him question more than once whether war was even worth it. Every time he did, he’d remember the death of the sister he could not remember and the manner they killed the child who’d been put in his place. 

Arya did not remember Egg from his last visit to Winterfell but that did not stop her from forcing a fast friendship with him. She had a way of making anyone feel comfortable; from the stableboy to the lords that gathered in the castle. Egg in comparison to the gruff northern lords was easy prey for her charm. Her friendliness made a marked difference from Viserys’ dour nature and his older cousin Nymeria’s intimidating way. They rode together not far from the castle grounds, she said she’d teach him how to snare rabbits if he could teach her how to use a sword. Apparently her mother frowned on such things. “Please,” she said, “Your father teaches me whenever he comes and Nym has taught me a little. Jon and Bran practice with me in the godswood when no one can see but you’re good. I’ve seen you practice when no one is looking.” _Nothing_ escaped her. Between their practices Aegon Sand learnt what he needed to know of Arianne...and Jon Snow. 

Lemore bustled out to greet them at the gates, enfolding the only two girls in the group in a hug. One was a golden haired girl with hair lighter than Lemore’s brown but who had her blue eyes. Her daughter, Tyene. The second, was as olive skinned as his mother. She had large, dark eyes and long, thick black hair that fell in ringlets to the middle of her back. It was just longer than Ashara’s. She had full lips, reddened by design he knew. Arianne. 

“I believe lying is a grave, grave sin, Septa Lemore,” she reprimanded in a husky voice. “You told me you were serving my mother!” 

“Oh, but I do serve your mother, Ari. I serve her by staying well away from those bearded priests of hers!” 

Arianne Martell had a beautiful smile and an even sweeter laugh. 

“Your Grace,” Lemore said by way of introduction, “this is Princess Arianne Nymeros Martell, heir to Dorne.” 

She curtsied in front of him. She was truly lovely, small yet full-figured, with sun-kissed skin and hair as dark as night.

He heard Ashara clearing her throat and saw a glint of amusement in Ser Oswell’s eyes that shook him out of his trance. 

“Princess Arianne,” he said, taking her soft hand, “I am pleased to meet you.” When he rose to look at her their eyes met, her slightly nervous look melted into a smile as soft as the sunrise. He couldn’t help but return it. 

“And I you,” he heard her mutter before she introduced her companions: a Dornish knight, named Ser Andrey Dalt, Garin, Arianne’s milk brother from childhood and their cousin. 

“Pleased to meet you _brother_ ,” Tyene giggled.

“I admit we have Prince Oberyn to thank for that,” he said sheepishly. 

“We’ve all been wanting to meet this mystery brother of ours!” 

“We all wondered why Uncle Oberyn didn’t bring you to live with us,” Arianne added, “but I understand now that Sunspear could only hide one ghost, not five...four of whom are among the most famous names in Westeros.” 

Taking her cue, Aegon introduced her to his companions. 

“This is-“

“Lady Ashara Dayne, the star of Dorne,” she finished for him. “Everyone speaks of your beauty from Sunspear to the Wall, my lady.”

“Die and everyone will sing your praises,” Ashara replied, laughing at the compliment. 

“I don’t believe that’s true, my lady,” she protested. “Many fair ladies have died and no one sings songs of their beauty. Everything they say of you is true.” 

She had a way of speaking to every one of them. She regaled each of the Kingsguard with tales of their prowess in battle. And for Ser Arthur she had returned his hand. Dawn. The sword he’d heard so much about; a pale as milkglass sword made from a falling star. “I was ordered to deliver this to its rightful owner,” she said, “I believe soon it will be time for you to wield it in battle, Ser Arthur.”

“I did not fight in the usurper’s rebellion,” he said, as he rubbed a finger down the length of his sword, a look of admiration upon his face. “Perhaps I will slay the usurper with this for His Grace.”

“I don’t believe that will be hard,” Arianne retorted, “I hear he is too fat to fit in his armour now.” 

“Are there any other ghosts we should be expecting?” she asked, looking around the yard. _No_ , he thought sadly, thinking of Viserys, _the only ghost here lives on in my conscience_. 

“It took me ages to work out who I was bringing back this sword to. Ned was too young to wield it and a squire still besides.”

Ser Arthur beamed at the mention of the nephew he’d never met. 

“He’s squiring for a Marcher Lord, Allyria’s betrothed. What’s his name?” she tapped a finger across her chin.

“Lord Beric Dondarrion,” Andrey Dalt offered. 

On and on they each asked about home. Ser Gerold’s nephew Leyton was still Lord of Oldtown, and Lady Whent still ruled Harrenhal. 

After a while, “You must be tired,” Lemore tutted. “And you’ve both lost weight. I’ll have them make you a nice meal and you will eat all of it.” Her tone brooked no argument. 

“I thought gluttony was a sin,” Arianne smirked. Aegon could not help but smile at her teasing of the septa. 

“Being grateful for blessings is a virtue, Ari.” Lemore rolled her eyes and pulled both girls away. “Garin, Drey, inside. You need to eat as well!” she threw over her shoulder.

“I believe our boy is...enchanted Ser Gerold,” Ser Oswell joked. The Kingsguard held him both in reverence and saw him for what he was, a boy they raised. Ser Oswell more than the others, though Ser Gerold only ever joked freely with him rarely. He remained even now a dutiful advisor. Ser Arthur was a mix of the two. 

“It’s a good thing he is,” Ser Arthur smiled, squeezing Egg’s shoulder. Aegon himself was unsure of how she would receive him. So for the rest of the day, he found himself too tongue-tied to say anything of note. She was older than him, three-and-twenty to his seven-and-ten. She was beautiful and a princess besides. Chances were that she’d had a lover or two before him. How would he measure up beside them?  
One day turned into two without a proper conversation between them and two days to a week before he knew. They only exchanged pleasantries, and news of Westeros and always in the company of others. They broke their fast together and supped together as well but he spoke more to her male companions than he did her, learning of her childhood and her likes and dislikes from the two men she considered her brothers.

“Is there someone else?” he heard her ask before Ashara’s laughter filled the air. Aegon was walking across the balcony above the gardens when he heard their voices. He leaned back into the shadows to hear more. 

“I’ve even followed Tyene’s stupid advice to pinch my cheeks to bring out roses that might make me look pretty for him,” she complained. “He doesn’t notice me. Perhaps I’m not the most beautiful woman in the world but I’m not ugly...I think.”

Ashara only laughed some more. “You? Ugly? Whoever thinks that has no eyes in their head.” He saw her lean over to the princess, “Egg has known that he would marry you since he was a boy. To Oberyn’s despair and Lemore’s delight he has never lain with another woman, such was his intent to honour his betrothal to you.”

“I-I didn’t know,” Arianne said, “I just- my mother told me how dutiful he was...and honourable and I didn’t want to be a disappointment to him.” 

Egg could listen no more. He would correct his wrongs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact women in Norvos shave their hair but highborn women get to wear wigs. The only men who get to grow beards are the bearded priests. Totally of 0 relevance to this story but I thought I’d throw in a bit of trivia from my latest read of a World of Ice and Fire.  
> Ser Barristan’s dash out of Duskendale feels like something out of Indiana Jones.  
> I know I said we’re going to Winterfell next but I decided to split Egg’s intro into two. Then I think we might have a mini chapter (think as short as Renly’s) from our fave Spider before Winterfell...you know just to bring us in tune with happenings in Westeros.


	16. Aegon

**Aegon:**

Lower Norvos was a vast baroque of noisy streets and alleys. Out of sight of the priests and nobles, here people lived freely. The lower city, with its riverman’s haunts, brothels, and taverns, was a much livelier place than the upper half of the city at the top of the Sinner’s Steps. Here the people feasted on red meat and river pike, washing it down with strong black beer and fermented goat’s milk. Here they heard the clangs of the city’s great bells and continued with their lives unseen. Up there the bells governed every part of Norvoshi life from when people could sleep, work, rest, take arms, pray and even have relations. Here, that only happened when the bearded priests sent out their patrols. He came here to remind himself of who he truly was, one of many lost in a sea of the downtrodden. He was Aegon Targaryen, Sixth of His Name, King of No One and Protector of Nothing. Their recent visitors had sought to posit him as something else. Egg felt suffocated and sought out the comfort of the lower city he knew best. 

Ser Gerold who had served in his great, great grandfather’s Kingsguard often said he had a lot in common with his forebear Aegon the Unlikely. Courtiers named him half a peasant because of his wanderings as a squire. Once, when Aegon shaved his head, Ser Oswell remarked that he had truly decided to walk in the shoes of _The Prince who was an Egg._ “All that’s missing is the floppy straw hat,” he laughed. Like the Aegon before him, and even his father from the tales he heard, Aegon felt most at ease when he was lost in a sea of faces, learning to appreciate life for what it truly was when the allure of affluence was taken away. At weeks-end, sometimes he came to the market, selling wine at a stall belonging to Captain Byan Votyris, an old wandering trader with skin like leather and a blue mustachio. In this part of town, Ser Gerold was his grandfather, Ser Oswell his father and Ashara, for her purple eyes, his mother. Since they were not Norvoshi, Ashara was not required to shave her head bald and Ser Gerold got to keep his beard. They had been trading in the market for so long that all had accepted them as part of the lower city where they came once a week. He had never told Lady Mellario of his occupation here. None from her household ventured this far in the lower city. 

Aegon rode off from the manse ordering the Kingsguard to remain behind. He often ordered them to do so but did not believe that they actually did as he ordered. He appreciated the space nonetheless, they did not make themselves known and that was enough for him. At times like this he understood his father best. Rhaegar Targaryen, born during the burning of Summerhall, used to retreat alone to the ruins of the Targaryen stronghold for days...weeks...at a time seeking respite from everything. Rhaegar had Summerhall and Aegon had the busy alleyways and taverns of Lower Norvos. 

Despite his decision to correct things between himself and the princess nigh on a moonturn ago, their relationship had gone on in much the same way, always speaking in view of others and trying to maintain the rules of decorum, even as Arianne took to wearing more and more revealing clothes that made him turn a scarlet red. He did not want to be lecherous nor to dishonour her. She was everything he was not, confident, funny, good with people. It wasn’t that he did not want her. He did. He was as green as they came and he just did not know _how_ to court her without embarrassing himself. Ashara often japed that it was the result of being raised by three Kingsguard knights and a septa. “Just speak to her,” Ashara advised him, “She’s good-natured and so are you. Many a shy man has won the heart of a woman like Arianne.” Even that did little to embolden him to move from acting as someone who lived in the same manse as her to the man who was her betrothed. 

“Right, I’m off,” he proclaimed to Byan and his grandsons. 

“No! Stay!!” the way-too-drunk Byan slurred. Aegon waved him away and began making his way back through the city to his horse. He’d been drinking rice-wine with them for hours, listening to their stories about trade in the more eastern-lands with the Dothraki and the Jogos Nhai. Sometimes Aegon wondered how different his life would be if Aerys Targaryen had never got to sit on the throne... _if Rhaegar had never met Lyanna Stark._

As his father’s first son, the throne would always have passed to him, the burden of rule would have been his, but perhaps he could have given it up to follow his dreams to see parts of the world that even Lomas Longstrider had not. Rhaenys may have reigned...she might have even married their little brother who would have grown up claiming his name, and living in safety _as_ a Targaryen and not a Snow. _Roads untraveled,_ Aegon muttered. _A road I will never know._ The only road open to Aegon now was to do his duty to House Targaryen, to get justice for Rhaenys and his mother. 

Aegon the Conqueror brought the realm together. Fate had it that Aegon the Unknown would be the one tasked with reclaiming it from the hands of a usurper whose hold on the throne was built on the murder of children.

 _I don’t want to do it,_ he used to shout when he was younger. _Viserys should do it, he’s the true dragon_ . The truth was that for Egg, anger, grief and a longing for family became so interlaced that he could not separate one from the other. He’d vacillate from fury at Rhaegar Targaryen’s actions before and during the rebellion to grief and longing for a lost father and future. He’d asked more than once why Rhaegar did not tell everyone the truth of his relationship with Lyanna Stark. _‘He might have prevented war!’_ Aegon shouted more than once when he found out. ‘ _Everyone believes my father to be a rapist!_ ’ he raged upon his return from the North. No words made anger stir inside him like the way his father was spoken about in Westeros. _He loved his children...everyone who knew him said so._ Even his mother who had no cause to truly love Rhaegar anymore never doubted his character. _Just his suitability as a husband._

 _He could have told them Lyanna chose him too_ , he thought more than once. _Perhaps if he did, I could be with my brother...then Viserys would have been the odd one out._ Aegon thought of Jon Snow often; his friend for a matter of days in Winterfell...his brother. _The motherless brother who got to grow up with my mother, while I had to be hidden away._ “I owe no loyalty to Eddard Stark,” said Ser Arthur when he told him the truth why he too was thought to be dead in Westeros. “Your brother is your other half, Egg. The usurper denied you both a future when the Lannisters killed the boy in your place. Jon could never know who he truly was for fear of what the usurper may do.” 

_Does he feel as alone as I do?_ Egg wondered more than once. They were both surrounded by love. Egg had his Kingsguard, Ashara, Lemore and Haldon but he still felt so deeply alone. Jon Snow had his uncle and his cousins. Arya Stark spoke of Jon as if he were the most important person in the world. But Egg had the benefit of knowing who he was. He had his mother, as distanced as she was from him by circumstances. He had her letters, the year she spent with him in Norvos and his two visits north. Jon had to grow up as an outcast bastard with no idea who his mother was. _Your place is Dragonstone,_ Aegon wished he could tell his brother every time he remembered Robb Stark’s taunting of him when they were children. He’d comfort himself with the story his mother had told them all those years ago. 

_“He gloated and gloated,”_ she said, _“thinking that the dragons were gone. What he didn’t know,”_ she whispered leaning forward, both boys moved closer waiting upon her next words, _“was that the dragons weren’t gone. They were hiding in the long grass until they learnt how to fly.”_ Aegon would get justice for himself and his brother. _The dragons aren’t gone,_ he told himself. _We are only hiding and our time will come._

He stepped into the stables and was greeted by several soft whinnies. Other than a few grooms, the stables were empty of people. His horse stuck his head out of his stall, greeting him with a whicker. 

“Easy, Balerion,” he laughed at the horse searching for a treat. “I didn’t forget.” Egg produced an apple from his pocket. Balerion was a black draft horse, one not out of place for a man who traded in the markets of Lower Norvos. He was not as majestic as a Sand Steed nor as big as the destriers the Lords of Westeros preferred or the coursers knights took to war, but he’d been a good and reliable friend to Aegon. He named him after his sister’s kitten Balerion who’d been with her when they murdered her. 

By the time they set off, sunset was not far off. Egg hoped he’d get home in time. Balerion trot, cantered and galloped as they made their way past terraced farms and the timber palisades and villages that dotted the outer city and finally the woods, as if he were taking flight, mane and tail flowing in the wind. Horse and man came down the narrow road to their manse, drawing Balerion to a halt when the dell opened up before him when he saw another rider on _his_ destrier! She was too short to be Ashara and too dark to be Lemore. Arianne Martell rose in the stirrups, cheering on the horse. With her silks bunched up, hair flowing in the wind she was a sight to behold as she cleared each obstacle in turn. 

“Good luck,” Ser Oswell said riding past. 

“I thought I ordered you to stay behind?” 

“Who said I was following you?” his father’s friend said. Ser Oswell was more a father to him than a servant and Egg had never been able to remind him of the difference between them in the way Viserys had. In this instance he only grinned.

Egg set Balerion to slow trot down the slope. Arianne halted the horse, shading her eyes against the setting sun. She climbed down the horse and strode purposefully towards him, in the silks that did little to hide the curves of her body from him. “A word, my king?” she asked, cutting into his path. “Do you have any interest in me whatsoever?” she sped on, clenching her fists as if to inspirit herself. 

Aegon blinked in surprise, confusion, embarrassment. His eyes swept her length, taking in the snug silks, her lustrous hair, her long lashes and dark eyes. “Princess, I-” 

“Because if you do not, I’d rather you told me now. I am the heir to Dorne, Sunspear is my seat and I will not be giving up my birthright for someone who doesn’t even see me!” she snapped. 

Egg struggled to choose the right response. In the end at risk of sounding an idiot, he told her the truth, “I do...want you that is,” he stammered. “I just-” 

She looked at him expectantly then, the furrowed brows and steeliness gone. _She’s as scared as me._

She was so much shorter than him so he climbed down from Balerion and closed the space between them, raising her chin so she looked up at him. “I’ve wronged you,” he admitted. “I apologise for that, Princess. Can we start again?” 

Arianne was silent for a long time, looking up at him. 

“I wasn’t sure how to speak to you,” he said babbling again. “I didn’t think you’d want me...I’ve never courted someone before.” He sounded a fool and more likely to push her away than ever before. It was what he’d been avoiding in the first place. _You are no true dragon,_ a voice that sounded too much like Viserys taunted him. _The dragon fears none and you cannot even speak to a girl._

Arianne laughed at him which only made him feel worse. He lowered his gaze when she only laughed louder, holding her stomach as she did so. Egg wanted to disappear. 

“I’m sorry, Princess,” he muttered but before he could move away she put a hand on his arm, still catching her breath. 

“I’m not laughing _at_ you,” she laughed. “It’s just, you wouldn’t think yourself unworthy if you knew the grooms my father has put in front of me over the last few years.” And so began an evening of a tired and half-drunk Egg listening to Arianne detail all the old lords her father had presented in front of her for marriage, knowing full well that she’d refuse them. 

They sat on a balcony above the central courtyard, drinking peppermint tea Ashara swore was the cure to every headache that came with too much drink. 

“Lord Grandison was the best of them.” Arianne said, “They called him the Greybeard but by the time I met him his beard was as white as a shroud. At the welcoming feast he fell asleep and Drey called that apt since his sigil was a sleeping lion. Garin dared me to tie a knot in his beard without waking him up. I didn’t of course. Like I said, he was the best of them, less quarrelsome than Estermont and more robust than Rosby. Then came Renly Baratheon-”

“Robert’s brother.” 

“Yes. I tried to entice him but his interests lie elsewhere...for a while I thought you might be like him. In Dorne many men choose other men to be their paramours.” 

“I do not!” 

She only laughed at him. “That is good to know. You’re a better match than I could imagine. When my father sent me here to you, he’d caught me escaping to ask Willas Tyrell to marry me.”

“Were you lovers?”

“No!” She scrunched her nose, “I’d never met him before and the Tyrells do not like us much. Willas became crippled at a tourney he competed in against Uncle Oberyn. His father has hated us since.” 

_I suppose I shouldn’t count on the Tyrells then,_ he thought. He was told that the Tyrells were among the last to bend the knee to Robert Baratheon. His mother had been there when they dipped their banners at Storm’s End...Lord Stark fell upon them after leaving King’s Landing in a fury about what happened to Rhaenys and the baby the Lannister men took for Aegon. He had been hoping they’d come to his side upon his return. _Perhaps they still will._

Arianne paused, looking away from him for a moment. “I went because I thought my father was giving my birthright to my brother, Quentyn...I found a letter he wrote to him saying that Quentyn would one day sit upon his seat. That was mine. I...wanted to have powerful allies. I didn’t know about my father’s plans to give me something better.” 

“Better?” Aegon sounded amused more than anything else. “I’m not a powerful ally and I am as far from giving you a throne as anyone you’ve mentioned.” 

“You are the Rightful King and I believe my father’s words when he said, I’d return a queen.” 

“Is that important to you? Being queen?” 

“Yes,” she admitted, deflating him further. As the years advanced, Egg felt further and further from the throne of his ancestors. He wanted to go home, he wanted to walk those halls but he felt so far from ever returning to King’s Landing as King Aegon Targaryen, Sixth of His Name. He wanted Arianne to see him for who he _was_ rather than who he was supposed to be: the usurped king of a kingdom half a world away. He wanted his life-partner to care for _him_ rather than his title... _a title I cannot even claim publicly._

“If I would give up my birthright it is only for a higher seat,” she continued before taking his hand in hers. “For what it’s worth, I believe in your cause. All of Dorne does. What they did to Aunt Elia is unforgivable and for that alone I would stand beside you...When my father said that I was to marry a king, I thought he meant Robert. I would _never_ let him take me to wife. Nor would I his son.” 

_You might have had a throne to call your own then,_ he thought. “Thank you,” he said, instead. 

“Have you seriously never been with another woman?” He didn’t know whether she was mocking him or not.

“I have known that I was betrothed to you since I was a boy of seven.”

“Why wait though? It would be years before you even saw me?” 

Aegon sighed, a long, weary sigh and turned his gaze to the horizon silhouetted against the limestone hills of Norvos. “My family’s recent history is full of examples of people following their heart when duty has tied them elsewhere. It didn’t end well for any of them.” _I did not want to tempt fate by falling for someone I should not have_.

“I’d beg to differ,” Arianne said, “they sing songs of the Prince of Dragonflies and Jenny of Oldstones throughout the Seven Kingdoms, and King Jaeherys and Queen Shaera had a happy marriage by all accounts. It takes bravery to defy your king for the woman you love.” 

Aegon only scoffed bitterly. “If my forebears had all done their duties,both Lords Baratheon would not have rebelled against their kings, Duncan’s son might have sat the throne, the Seven Kingdoms would have been spared a reign under a king as mad as Aerys, and I would not have had to spend my life in hiding separated from the only family I have left.” The subject was a sensitive one for him. From a young age, Aegon decided that, with few exceptions, each time a Targaryen followed their heart, disaster often followed. His father’s folly was just the latest in a long line of short-sighted decisions that led to the deaths of thousands and ultimately brought about the end of Targaryen rule. What Maegor had started, Aegon decided, would finish with Rhaegar. He would not make the same mistakes as those who came before him. _Why tempt fate with what you should not have?_

“Wait here,” she said suddenly. I have something that will go well with your tea. She came back shortly with a box of candied gingers. “A gift from Illyrio.” She put the sweets in front of him.

“You’ve had these for a month!” 

“I couldn’t decide whether or not you deserved them,” she grinned. 

“I’m surprised you haven’t finished them,” he teased her, licking his fingers. 

Arianne tilted her head to the side and regarded him amusedly. “Did Drey tell you? Or Garin?” 

Aegon shook his head. “Arya Stark.” 

The laughter that poured from her lips was as light as a feather, full of light and he couldn’t help but join in, taking the moment to admire her, her graceful neck, her full lips, her lined eyes. She said some words but he didn’t hear what she said. He must have been awkwardly gawping. “What?” she asked, looking at him as if he were the fool he was. 

“You’re beautiful.” It felt right saying so. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. _And mine._

Arianne moved ever closer to him, smoothing a finger down his cheek. Her eyes were made of earthy hues, her hair an obsidian waterfall that dropped down her back. And her mouth, Aegon wanted to kiss those lips. Arianne continued brushing her fingers down his face, his neck. She moved back up again, tracing the outline of his mouth, sweeping her finger back and forth over his lips, breathing heavily as she did so. Arianne moved even closer. Egg sat there frozen, excited. She leaned in, so her forehead rested against his. Her warm breath on his lips radiated, spreading throughout his body in the span of a blink it took for her to brush her lips against his nose, his cheek, the outline of his lips and finally she kissed him, soft and slow and new. She held herself there for a few moments longer before pulling away to stare at him. Their lips spoke no more words, her eyes sweeping down to his lips told him all he needed to know. She was older, more experienced but she was warm and wanting and here with him. Aegon pulled her up, into his lap, slowly kissing up her neck, letting himself be guided by her whimpers and all the stories he’d heard from Viserys. He slowly worked his way back to her tender, full lips, kissing her again, this time more comfortably. The panic in his body made way for relief, for lust. He moved his hand from her cheek to the back of her head, fingers trailing through the silk of her hair, pulling her into him and deepening the kiss. Arianne pushed him back, pulling up her silks to straddle his lap before she bent back down over him, taking his lips in hers, holding on to his shoulders and all while dragging her hips forward and back. Egg felt himself harden underneath her, embarrassed but too lust-filled to care, not when Arianne was leaning her forehead against his, panting against his lips. She took his hands and splayed them against her rear, asking him to squeeze. 

“You’ve been asking others about me,” she panted. 

“I’ve asked everyone who knows you to tell me about you.” Aegon pulled her back down again. 

“I’m sleeping by your side,” she said that night, when they left the balcony. “Only sleeping,” she assured him before he could object. “There is a rift between us, Aegon and we can only heal it by staying close, getting used to each other. If you don’t want to sleep we can talk,” she added, slipping under his covers. “A bed is a good place to talk.”

Talking soon made way for exploring each other and a new routine between them: the first in a great many night spent laughing with each other. She never mocked him for his inexperience, telling him more than once that she found his honour admirable. She even shared her own doubts about their match.

“I wasn’t sure you’d want me,” she told him one night. “You were this king, raised by names I’d always heard of in songs...I wasn’t sure if you even knew about me. I hadn’t known of you.”

When he first shared his reluctance to bed her because it would dishonour her, she dismissed his fears. “We are to marry, Aegon. I assure you my father will not care.” 

“But what if we have a child out of wedlock?” he asked.

She pointed to a bag of herbs beside the bed. 

Arianne taught him _things_ and every passing day he felt like less of a green boy. Ser Gerold was always too upright to say anything, and Ser Arthur pretended he didn’t know, Ser Oswell, however, would wink at him whenever he saw the two of them together. Ashara only provided them with more moon tea. The day Septa Lemore found out just what they’d been getting up to, however, she had them make penances for an entire day on their knees in the small sept in the manse.

“We are just appreciating the other’s creation,” Arianne teased the septa, “If you hadn’t been grateful for Uncle Oberyn, Tyene wouldn’t be here.” Lemore laughed before doubling the amount of time they spent in the sept praying for forgiveness. Not that it stopped Arianne making her way to his rooms. 

As often as they spent time alone together, however, they spent with her friends who became his own. He laughed with Garin, trained with Drey and got to know the cousin who was his sister to all of Westeros. 

One night they sat on their balcony, Ari was nestled against him, telling him stories of her childhood with their cousins while tracing the outlines of the birthmark on his chest. 

“I’m jealous,” he told her. 

“Of what?”

“Your family-“

“Our family,” she corrected him, tipping his chin up so he looked at her. “Once we return to Westeros, the Sand Snakes will love you as a brother, you’ll see and all of Dorne will welcome you home, you are the sun’s son, Aegon. Your family is in the thousands.”

“I don’t know about the Sand Snakes,” he joked, “Sarella was nice enough but Nymeria scares me.”

“You don’t know scary until you’ve met Obara.” She laughed loudly before she mellowed to add, “Trust me, Egg, they’ll love you and you’ll love them. We’re a close family. All of us.”

Aegon smiled sadly, swirling the liquid in his cup. _Family,_ the word felt so alien to him, something familiar yet just out of reach. 

“What are you thinking about?” 

“About family. What it is. Everyone who has raised me has had to give up seventeen years of their lives. Lemore left her daughter for years at a time to instruct me in the ways of the Faith. I’ve heard more than once that Ashara was the most beautiful woman in Westeros. She never wed or had children of her own. She gave up everything to raise me here alone. The Kingsguard, three of the most famous knights in Westeros let everyone believe they were killed just to raise me in hiding. And my mother…” He felt the tears sting his eyes before they could well. “I have only ever met my mother thrice.” Aegon gulped, sighing loudly. Of all the things he never forgave Robert Baratheon and his men for, separating him from his mother was the second only to his anger for the sister whose life they cut short. “The longest I’ve spent with my mother is a year, when she stayed here during a Northern winter.”

“Why could you not stay in Deepwood Motte with her? Lord Stark and Lord Glover let the Kingsguard leave to find you.”

“They didn’t.”

“But..” Arianne looked confused. “You spent time in the North with both lords and they both know the Kingsguard are alive.”

“When my mother, her husband, Uncle Oberyn, Ned Stark and his men went to the Tower of Joy, no one knew whether I was alive or not...my mother hoped I was. She was the one who sent them to find me. My father thought that my mother, Rhaenys and I would be safe in Dragonstone even if he fell at The Trident. Dragonstone was an island, protected by the royal fleet, and a fortress besides. Lyanna Stark was alone in a tower on the Prince’s Pass so he left her, his wife-“ 

Arianne gasped. “He married her?”

“He did.”

She bit her lip before any words spilled out. Egg was sure there was nothing she could say that he hadn’t thought before. 

“My grandparents married because of a prophecy,” he explained. 

“The Prince that was Promised,” Arianne confirmed. “Jenny’s wood’s witch.”

“He read about another prophecy of a dragon with three heads. He dreamt he’d have three children. Me, Rhaenys and a third, Visenya. My mother couldn’t give him the third child he so coveted, so he took Lyanna to bride, hoping for his Visenya...He didn’t truly think he’d die at The Trident. He had plans to depose Aerys, plans that had been thwarted at Harrenhal.” Ser Oswell had told him of the council his father wanted to call at the tourney. “Robert’s great-grandfather rebelled against Rhaegar’s once, over a broken betrothal. The rebellion was quelled and my father hoped that he could quell this one as well. Robert was his cousin...I don’t believe he truly wanted to do him harm. My father had the greater host. Yet despite his confidence that he’d return to take the Iron Throne and proclaim Lyanna Stark his second wife, he left his two best friends and the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard to protect the wife and child that were unprotected from Aerys’ reach and Robert’s as well were he to be victorious.”

The colour drained out of Arianne’s face. 

“By the time my mother, Lord Stark and their party reached the tower, Lyanna was dying of a fever and from blood loss after the birth of her child. My mother convinced Lord Stark to let his sisters’ protectors go because Lyanna was not held there against her will.”

“And the child?”

“Lord Stark took my brother, raising him as his bastard.”

“Jon.” Arianne was stunned. “I-we-“ she stuttered, sitting up properly. “I...always thought he was Ashara’s.”

“Ashara?” Now it was Egg’s turn to be confused.

“Everyone thought he was Ashara’s. Theirs is known to be a tragic love. In Westeros people debate whether Ashara killed herself because of the brother Lord Stark killed or the child he took away from her. I-“

“I didn’t know that,” Egg admitted, suddenly feeling sad for the woman who was his mother in all but name.

“Aunt Elia dotes on him,” Ari continued. “If anyone had a right to mistreat him it’s Aunt Elia. Lady Stark treats him like an unwanted stain on her. Whenever they had feasts she’d not allow him to sit on the high tables. He’s-“

“The Rightful Prince of Dragonstone, my brother... I haven’t seen him since I was seven, and he six…”

“He’s worse than you around girls,” Ari laughed, before she began telling him of everything she knew about Jon Snow. 

“When we return, do you think Lord Stark will stand with you?” 

“I don’t know,” Egg voiced his doubt. 

“He will have to once we tell everyone he’s raising a Targaryen in his home. Robert will never have him by his side again. 

“Don’t!” snapped Aegon, grabbing her wrist and startling her. He let go the moment he realised. “My mother swore an oath to Lord Stark never to endanger my brother. I will never endanger him either...not even to claim the Iron Throne. I won’t let them do to Jon what they did to Rhaenys, what they thought they did to me. Nor will I endanger Lord Stark. He once saved my mother and he was the only person in that court intent on getting justice for Rhaenys and I.”

Before Egg could say anything more, someone began hammering at the door to his room. He groaned, before getting up to put on a shirt. 

“What is it?” he called out, walking back into the room. 

“Lord Connington is back, Your Grace,” Haldon answered through the door. “He comes with news.” 

“Who is it?” asked Arianne, wrapping a cloak around herself.

“Lord Jon Connington.”

When Arianne still looked confused, he continued. “He was the Lord of Griffin’s Roost and a very good friend of my father. They once squired together and when my father was knighted, he squired for him. He was one of his closest friends in court and later became Hand of the King during the Rebellion.” Arianne tied the ties of his tunic for him. 

“Then what happened?”

“He was defeated at Stoney Sept by Ned Stark, Hoster Tully and Robert Baratheon. Aerys exiled him for the defeat. After his exile, he joined the Golden Company for a time...before Spider found him and sent him to us.”

“The Spider?”

“The man who saved my life.”

“Where is he coming from?”

“Pentos.” Aegon slid his boots on. “We are so far away from everything here. Jon travels to Illyrio and the Free Cities closest to Westeros twice a year. The Spider sends them news and what Jon doesn’t bring, Uncle Oberyn does.” Egg started striding toward the door when he stopped suddenly, “Ari,” he warned on his way out, “no one else is to know about my brother, including Lord Connington.” _He’s a good man, blinded by hatred._

Once greetings were exchanged, and Jon was introduced to Arianne, the Griffin Lord shared his news. “The Spider says Robert’s court is full of intrigue-“

“What’s new about that?” Ser Oswell asked, the boredom in his voice unmistakable. “Have you forgotten _our_ time in court? A man could not walk three steps before being pulled into one scheme or other.”

“Aye, friend, I remember,” said Jon, “but this is worse. The Lannister woman is at odds with both the usurper’s brothers and they in turn hatch schemes to ruin her. The crown is deep in debt to the Iron Bank and to Tywin Lannister making Tywin the true ruler of Westeros. With the factions developing in court, Varys says he’d give it a year tops before war breaks out. We have to ready ourselves for a return.”

News that Aegon had always assumed would elate them all was met with a stunned silence. They had waited seventeen years for this. 

“The Cheesemonger offers to pay for our king to return home with the Golden Company at his back.

“What’s in it for him?” asked Ser Arthur. Even all these years later he had no love for the Spider or his friend. 

“Your Grace, he would ask you for the honour of being your Master of Coin,” answered Jon Connington. 

“He wants to control your purse strings.”

“Ser Gerold. What would you advise me?” The White Bull had served five Targaryen generations in his sixty years starting from Aegon the Unlikely to Egg himself. 

“Your Grace,” Ser Gerold began, “Bittersteel and the Blackfyres made Westeros bleed for the best part of a century. There are men still alive in the Seven Kingdoms who remember the terror brought about by the Blackfyres and the Golden Company. When Lord Ormund Baratheon fell in battle, command of King Jaeherys’ host fell to me. Ser Barristan slew Maelys the Monstrous, your own grandfather fought in that war, as did your enemies. Tywin Lannister was there, so was Lord Hoster Tully and his brother. If you return with the men that reigned terror in Westeros, your enemies will use that against you.” Ser Gerold had always been a man of few words and great action. 

“Who do I count on in their place?” asked Egg. “I have Dorne. That is all. How can I take the Seven Kingdoms with forty thousand men at most?”

“Not only Dorne,” Arianne noted, “my father has married Quentyn to Lord Randyll Tarly’s daughter.”

“A true soldier if ever there was one.”

“And Ten thousand men does not an army make,” said Ser Gerold.

“It’s ten thousand more than he has now. Five hundred knights, each with three horses. Five hundred squires, with one mount apiece. And their elephants. Why else has Princess Elia been building a fleet if not for a day like this?”

Arianne watched the entire exchange silently. As did the others around the table. Drey and Garin looked particularly out of place. 

“Fat lot of good elephants have done them. They have been defeated every time they have crossed into Westeros from Bittersteel himself, the Blackfyre pretenders that followed down to Maelys himself on the Stepstones.”

“Your Grace,” Jon Connington appealed. “Robert’s hold on the throne continues to weaken. Our chance to strike is fast approaching. The Golden Company will swear their swords to the Last Dragon for a chance to go home. I failed your father. I will not fail you. I know those men. You can trust them to give you the heads of the traitors Robert Baratheon, Hoster Tully, Eddard Stark, and Jon Arryn.” His defeat at the Battle of the Bells weighed heavily on the Griffin Lord. “People might claim that the realm was lost when Rhaegar fell to Robert’s warhammer on the Trident,” he once told Egg, “but the Battle of the Trident would never have been fought if the griffin had only slain the stag there in Stoney Sept. The bells tolled for all of us that day. For Aerys and his queen, for Elia of Dorne and Rhaenys... for every true man and honest woman in the Seven Kingdoms. And for my silver prince.”

“You seem to be naming people who beat you, Jon,” Ashara quipped. “We have spent seventeen years hiding Aegon. Why would we announce him to a bunch of sellswords as like to sell him to his enemies as to support him?”

“All these years later and you find it in your heart to defend the man who left you with a bastard,” Jon Connington scowled. 

“Jon-“ Arthur growled. 

Before he could say anything however, Egg interrupted him. “Lord Connington, I ask you to watch your words.” 

“Thank you, Egg,” Ashara smiled. “Lord Connington thinks all people are like him, utterly mad for a married person who doesn’t see them at all.”

“Your Grace, I failed your family once,” he said, ignoring her, “it is my duty to see you return to your rightful throne.”

Egg continued to listen to each person advising him, all while wishing his mother was here. For the year she spent with him in Norvos, she instructed him in everything she knew of Westerosi politics. Whenever they discussed war, his mother always chose the most peaceful route. _Perhaps I can be the king to unite the red and black dragon._

“If we’ll invade,” he said instead, “I must get to know my realm.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes: 
> 
> I find it hilarious that Shaera Targaryen and her brother Daeron were betrothed to Luthor Tyrell and Olenna Redwyne and both of them were like ‘Nope, I’m out’ so Olenna and Luthor ended up marrying each other. 
> 
> Our boy Egg is travelling to Westeros, what could go wrong? 
> 
> Ps: happy one month anniversary to this story! I will correct grammar mistakes on re-read. It’s 1am where I am.


	17. Eddard

**Eddard**

She came to him warm and willing again, hair flowing behind her in the wind. Ned rushed out of the bed and flung open the shutters to gaze up at the heavens. The moon was a silver orb dangling in the pitch-black curtain that was powdered with stars scattered like sequins. In the midst of it all was the Sword of the Morning, the reminder of his guilt, once the object of his most ardent desire. Whenever she came to him in his dreams - and she came to him almost every night recently - he’d gaze up at the star that reminded him he had no right to dream of her. The longing, the fleeting bliss of a reunion with her in his dreams would always be chased away by a guilt that would fan out across his chest, eating at him slowly the moment he opened his eyes. The fire would burn in his mind and throat, remorse and contrition hitting him like a hammer through the chest. _Ashara is dead. Cat lies next to me. She has been a good and loving wife for seventeen years._

Even as he thought that, damn him, Ned Stark could not take his eyes off the star that had haunted him for years. _The star I loved. The star I felled...Cat is my wife._ They had five children and Cat had been a loving and dutiful wife for seventeen years. _What kind of man dreams of a woman who died so long ago when his wife lies beside him?_

Ned walked over to the hearth. The fire smouldered sullenly, emitting little heat and light. He was glad for it. He’d always found this room too hot for his liking. Now that spring was here the heat was almost unbearable. 

All around Winterfell cows calved, spring wheat was thrashed, the land sprang to life, the weather warmed, and Ned worked on sowing the seeds of his dream for spring. He traced a finger on the outlines of the map on his desk. Trade with the Free Cities had enriched the North and finally with spring here, Ned had every intention to put the coin to use, _now is the time for planting_. After all the death that lay in his wake, he wanted to do some good in his life. He had tried to do the right thing at every turn ever since he returned to Winterfell anyway but with this, perhaps he’d leave something worthwhile behind so when they mentioned his name, they’d mention something other than all the loss connected to it. 

“Ned?” Cat sighed sleepily, rubbing her hand on the empty space beside her. “What’s wrong?” 

“Nothing, love.” He smiled as he walked back to the bed. “It was too warm.” He moved closer to and she in turn moved to settle on his chest. “You know what they say, Starks were made for the cold.” 

She chuckled as she always did when he said so. “I believe you’ve built your castle in the wrong place then, my lord.”

“I believe you’re right.” Ned stroked her hair. _So different from Ashara’s...yet still so beautiful._

“I know why you were up,” she quipped. “It worries me too.”

“What does?”

“Our boy is a man, about to marry. Ned…” she tutted with good humour, “It’s nothing to lose sleep over though, love.”

“He’s not even seven-and-ten yet...I hadn’t even been _betrothed_ at his age. There was so much I didn’t know at his age.”

“You were a second son. Brandon was four-and-ten when we were betrothed. Robb is two years older than him,” Cat informed him, shifting to look at him in the eye. _Brandon._ His brother’s name should not have sounded so harsh to his ears. Ned had truly loved him once. _I still do_. In their marital bed however, Brandon was Cat’s measure of manhood - the measure Ned could never reach. 

“What _should_ worry us is finding betrothals for the girls.” 

They’d had this conversation countless times. Ned was resolute on not repeating the mistakes of the past and Cat was determined to find the girls matches.

“They are still too young, Cat. We should sleep, dawn is still hours away.” He shut his eyes, hoping sleep would bring an end to this conversation. It always ended the same way: with frayed nerves. 

Cat however, had had enough of his stalling. “Both girls have flowered, Ned,” she said, sitting up. “Sansa turns five-and-ten soon and Arya’s name day has come and gone. She is four-and-ten. I was younger than both of them when my father betrothed me to Brandon.”

Ned’s sigh echoed in the expectant silence at the mention of his brother‘s name again. All these years later and there were still four people in their marriage. The difference between them was that he had never mentioned Ashara’s in Winterfell again. _No, I only dream of her while my wife lies next to me._

Her eyes softened with compassion. “Ned,” she sighed, moving his hair back from his face, “They are my daughters too. I only want the best for them. But the older they get without a betrothal, the smaller the pool of suitable heirs they will have to choose from.”

“Fine.” Ned conceded. “Rickard Karstark’s heir is not yet betrothed. It has been years since Karstark and Stark joined in marriage.” With Ned marrying a Southron wife and Lyanna being betrothed to one once upon a time, Ned wanted to once more tie House Stark with those of his bannermen. “We can introduce them at the wedding. If Sansa is agreeable to him...then we’ll see.” 

Cat shook her head, her face appalled. “Sansa would not be happy with such a match, Ned. She deserves to shine at the centre of the world, not freeze along the northern shores.”

“Like you, my lady?”

“That’s not what I meant.” Her eyes softened once more, her mouth curled into a sad smile and she cupped his cheek. “I have known happiness, love and respect by your side, Ned. We married during war. Our children are the children of Summer. They will never know such hardship. Sansa dreams of knights and pageantry. I want her to have all that she dreams of. That is all.”

“Do you have anyone in mind?” She must have done to bring it up now of all times. Cat’s smile was resplendent. _Of course she does._

“Lord Renly is yet to take a bride, my lord. The king was once like a brother to you and betrothed to your sister. I hear Renly is his mirror image. He is a lord beloved by his people, a true knight besides and powerful at court. Sansa would do well in the South, Ned and she would love a husband as gallant as Renly.”

“Renly is much older than her, Cat.”

“Well,” she smiled. And Ned should have known then that Renly was no true suggestion of hers. “I hear the prince, Joffrey, is yet untied…” Cat splayed her fingers across his chest, “and he is of an age with her.” She kissed his neck. “It’s been so long since I last saw Lysa, Ned. I could visit her at court. Sansa is a true beauty and will only grow more beautiful with age. I do not doubt for a moment that she would catch the prince’s eye and His Grace would never refuse a joining of our two houses.”

“You mean to parade our daughter in King’s Landing?”

“I mean to find her a secure home, Ned... and a secure future.”

“The Red Keep is not as secure as you think, Cat.” _They killed two children there and nearly killed Princess Elia._

“Ned.” Her voice was terse. “You cannot avoid this forever. Try as you might. Prince Doran asked for your daughter’s hand in marriage for his son and you refused him. Arya might have been happy there. It’s the one place they might have accepted her as she is. If you turn everyone away, your daughters will turn to spinsters in your own lifetime. Who will look after them when we die?.”

Ned considered her with amusement, chuckling as he did so. “I didn’t say no,” he corrected her impishly. “I said she was still too young. He was free to ask me again but he chose to betroth Trystane elsewhere.” The truth was that Ned did not want to send his children away. He wanted Northern husbands for his daughters; men who would treat them well, whose fear of the ire of House Stark would restrain them from mistreating them. 

“Do you expect the world to wait on you, Ned?” Cat moved away from him, brows furrowed in frustration. 

“Arya doesn’t want to marry yet.”

“No, she would rather traipse around with children of questionable birth, and act like she’s a man. She missed her embroidery circle today to race through the Wolfswood with Jon _Snow_ .” As always she spat _Snow_ out.

“I believe you have a flair for the dramatic, my lady,” he told her. “Lyanna was like Arya at her age. _Half a horse_ they called her. It didn’t make her a man.”

“Lady Lyanna was already betrothed at her age and did her duty to House Stark.”

 _I forced her into a betrothal she did not want and started a series of events that led to the deaths of my father, sister and brother. I lost Ben too in the process._ His daughter was even more wilful than his sister. He would not sacrifice her life the way he sacrificed Lyanna’s. Sometimes when he looked at Arya, he thought it was Lyanna staring back at him, scrunching her face as she used to do and presenting him with flowers the way Lyanna had once done for their father. Those moments made tears well up in his eyes every time. Ned felt as if he’d been given a chance to correct his wrongs. Every time his daughter smiled, he imagined it was Lyanna. So he tried his best to keep the smile on her face, hoping to do for his daughter what he failed to do for Lyanna: put her happiness first. 

“Ned, Arya cannot keep acting like this. You do her no favours by letting her act like a child.”

“She _is_ a child.”

“She is flowered and a lady besides. She will have to do her duty, Ned. As we all have. Gods know that she has neither the looks nor graces bestowed upon Sansa. She will find it hard to find a suitable husband as it is without you rejecting every proposal that-“

He bristled away from her. “My daughter looks like my mother and sister, Cat.” 

“You forget Lady Lyanna stayed with us at Riverrun before the wedding. Her hair gleamed in the sun and her beauty spoken about everywhere after Harrenhal. She was a courteous lady with an easy way with everyone. If only Arya would act like her.”

“Your courteous Lady Lyanna beat a group of squires with a stick at that very tourney. You did not know her at all, Cat.” Ned exhaled loudly. “Enough about Lyanna. Have you even _asked_ Arya whether she _wants_ to marry?”

“We both know what her answer will be. She will say no, precisely because she knows _you”_ she poked his chest, “will allow her to refuse everyone who comes for her hand. It does not serve her in the long run, Ned.”

“Arya will marry one day, Cat. She knows this, I know it, you know it. Let her enjoy the last of her childhood for now. She is not harming anyone.”

Cat only scoffed. “If she continues to act this way, who will marry her Ned? She carries a dagger on her body. _A gift from Prince Oberyn,_ she says. I found a whip in her room, a gift from one of his bastards, and a Morningstar, a gift from another and a small bow from a third. Her _only_ friends are bastards. She steals Bran’s breeches and-“ 

“She gets on well enough with Wylla, Cat. Not to mention Lady Mormont’s girls and Rickard’s daughter...Arya is of the North. Perhaps she will never be a courtly lady. That is fine. Neither will the Mormont girls or the girls of the mountains.”

“Arya is my daughter too, Ned.”

“I know, love-“

“And I will not have my daughter hide her children’s bastardy by proclaiming their father is a bear. Nor will I allow her to freeze in those mountains of yours with a husband who does not have a true castle of his own.”

Ned chuckled at her and kissed her brow. “Some Starks have more of the wolf blood than others, my lady. That is all I meant to say. My mother was not a courtly lady nor was her mother, a Flint of the mountains. Not being the perfect southron lady has never stopped a Stark maid from marrying. Weapons or no. There is yet time for both girls to marry, my love,” he smiled, running his thumb through the crease between her brows. “Now,” he added with a yawn, “I’d like to sleep, Cat.” He lied down and faced away from her, yawning once again. “Soon the lords of the North will begin descending upon us. I promised the boys we’d go hunting together before we lost the opportunity to spend time alone.”

“You may sleep,” she conceded, “but this has not ended here.”

“Ned?” he heard her whisper moments later, as she wrapped her arms around him, “You should introduce her to Lord Karstark’s heir.”

“I thought you didn’t want Sansa to freeze along the northern shores.”

“Not Sansa. Arya.” 

—

He saw the daughter in question that morning when they set off for their hunt. 

“My lord,” said old Martyn pointing at a shape with a long braid flying behind her as she raced against another shape. “Is that Arya?”

“It could only be her, old man. And I bet that’s her butcher’s boy,” Theon Greyjoy drawled, pointing at the head of red hair bouncing awkwardly on the horse behind her. 

Ned heard his ward mutter in a lower voice, “She’s probably taken him for a lover. _The lady that’s not a lady and her butcher’s boy,_ a tale coming to a tavern new you-“ The perpetual smile on his face was wiped out the moment Jon Snow lept off his horse, unhorsed Theon and began pummelling him. Ned let him get in a few punches before he ordered Jon to stop. 

“Lord Stark. You didn’t hear what he said,” his boy protested.

“Lord Stark...the bastard,” Theon managed through a bloody mouth. 

“I did hear him, Jon,” Ned interjected. “For his slander, Theon can walk for the rest of the hunt….or you may return to Winterfell to ponder your words.” He added. “You will remember that Arya is my daughter and a lady of Winterfell.”

Balon Greyjoy’s heir wiped the blood off his mouth, climbed up his courser and began riding back towards the castle without another word. 

Ned turned his eyes once more to Jon. _You really are your mother’s son._ He thought words that he could never say. _Not while Robert is still alive anyway._

“Father,” Arya mumbled when they approached her, biting her lip guiltily as Lyanna always did when caught doing something she shouldn’t. “Good morrow,” she added for good measure. 

“Do you not have a class right now?” Sansa had greeted him on her way there. 

_This_ daughter only scowled. “Septa Mordane says I’m quite hopeless and no one would miss me anyhow. None of them like me. Septa Mordane said I had the hands of a blacksmith. I went to see Mikken to see if he’d teach me his trade but he wasn’t there. Mycah-“ she motioned to the boy riding, badly, up to them, “doesn’t know how to ride a horse properly so I decided I’d put my only other talent to use.” Her expression was a picture of smugness. 

“Hullen is the Master of Horse.”

“Hullen doesn’t even know Mycah and besides... _you_ said a lord should be aware of his people’s needs.”

“You’re not a lord, Arya,” Robb advised her. 

“Are those my new breeches?”

She looked down at the article of clothing in question. “They’re not _that_ new.” 

“They are!” Bran looked aghast. “Father!”

“Arya, enough. You’ve had your fun this morning. Your mother will be worried. Go back to the castle, apologise to Septa Mordane-“

“Why does Bran get to go? He’s younger than-“

“I’m going to be a knight,” his son announced proudly. “Hunts are key to learning how to traverse woods, perfect your horsemanship _and_ how to place your men. Princess Elia said Ser Arthur, Ser Gerold and Ser Barristan were able to save her from

the Kingswood Brotherhood because they used to hunt with their fathers.”

“They don’t have woods in Dorne, stupid-“

“But they do in the Stormlands and Ser Barristan is the greatest knight alive.” Bran stuck his tongue out to make his point further. 

“Father-“

Ned raised a hand. “Arya you _cannot_ ride out alone. It’s too dangerous.”

“I didn’t ride out alone.” She pointed to the butcher’s son.

“You rode out without protection.”

“I didn’t,” she said, producing the dagger Cat mentioned to him the night before. 

“And do you know how to use it?”

“Stick them with the pointy end,” she grinned, exchanging a look with a laughing Jon. She had a way of making his most sullen boy laugh. She had a way of making everyone laugh...except the poor woman given the impossible task of turning her to a lady. Not to mention her sister. Raising daughters was the hardest thing Ned had ever done. His two girls were as different as two people could be. 

“Off with you,” he said, restraining his desire to laugh. She always had something to say. “Apologise to your mother and to Septa Mordane. We will see you on our return.”

“But-“

“I promise,” he relented, “you can come with us on the next hunt. Your mother will be worried now. In fact, she can come on the next hunt as well. It has been a while since she has.”

“She’ll only force me to sit side saddle,” he heard her mutter before she said, “..fine but Mycah-“

“Will come with us. He can practice his riding there.” That seemed to make both her and the boy in question happy.

“Thank you milord.”

Ned watched his daughter ride back before turning back to ride to the jagged line of the Wolfswood with its old oaks, sentinels, soldier pines and black brier. He reigned in his grey destrier at the edge of the forest, prompting the rest of their party to follow suit with the exception of Jory, Farlen and a few of his men who plunged deeper into the wood with the hunting dogs straining on their leashes. Ned had wanted to spend time with his sons. The hunt was only an excuse. He did not have many such opportunities with his own father. 

Robb was excited at the prospect of marrying Wylla Manderly of New Castle, the granddaughter of Wyman Manderly. The outspoken girl had completely enamored his son. To Catelyn’s horror, she dyed her hair a green that matched that of the merman of Manderly. The girl believed in the new gods and was a lady in every other sense, not to mention from a rich family which quelled Cat’s initial opposition. Her son being quite so captivated by the girl also convinced Cat of the match. Robb had grown to become a son both Ned and Cat could be proud of: courteous, honourable, courageous, kind. He had never known that it was possible to love someone so much before his son was born. Now, his heart was split into six equal pieces made up of each of his children, and Lyanna’s. 

As his son spoke of his betrothed, Ned could hardly restrain a smile. He too had once known such infatuation. Bran spoke of his desire to squire with a Manderly knight and Jon brooded on the side. Ned moved to sit beside him. “What about you, Jon,” Ned asked him, “What do you wish to do with your life?” 

Lyanna’s boy, Ned’s son, only looked into the distance. “I don’t know, father,” he said sadly. “I will speak to Maester Luwin, I-” 

Suddenly Jory emerged from the forest striding toward them with a smile on his face. “We’re trailing a great stag, my lord. You will not want to miss this!”

“I measured the tracks myself,” his father added. “I believe it is a stout and worthy stag for our groom.” Ned guided his horse into the wood before turning to Robb. “When the time comes, would you be the one to make the kill?” 

A smile brightened Robb’s face. “It would be my honour, father,” he replied before careening ahead. 

The stag had bloodied and broken antlers. It lurched toward them in flight of the howling pack of dogs. It’s brown coat was wet and roughened with sweat and blood. It was a magnificent stag, one of the largest Ned had ever seen. A royal stag for sure even with the broken antlers _._ It was dignified even in this state of distressed flight. Ned turned to Jon in whose hand the horn rested. A signal from him would bring an end to the deer’s life. Jon raised the horn to his lips, blasting a series of harsh sounds that set off the dogs. The hounds drove the stag past them toward a huge clearing where generations old oaks stood sentinel. For a moment Ned wondered whether these same trees had witnessed his own father and his grandfathers before him hunt in this very part of the forest. The dogs closed in on the tiring stag. In an eye blink of a moment it tumbled to the ground, slipping on the wet grass. The dogs closed in further. Struggling to its legs, the stag faced them, head lowered, broken antlers still threatening. Blood trailed from its head and side and mixed with the foam at its mouth. A wolf...larger than any Ned had ever seen staggered past them. Blood marked its muzzle. 

“Robb, move back,” ordered a Ned who was unable to keep his eyes off the wolf. 

The wolf ran at the stag. A moment later the waiting stag had dipped its head and then jerked upwards throwing the wolf upwards. It slammed against the floor before standing up to its feet once more, snarling with all its teeth out.

“It’s as big as a direwolf,” Bran proclaimed wondrously.

The deer was clearly exhausted, its movements stumbling. Ned could not take his eyes off the forthcoming war between the stag and wolf. He stared at the frightened eyes of the stag and the dogged determination of the wolf. 

Ned did not even realise when Robb had dismounted, he only saw the sun glint off Robb’s raised spear as it hurtled through the air piercing the stag’s muscle before the wolf in question finished the job for him. Blood spewed outward, staining both the wolf’s mouth and the stag’s coat, turning the burnt brown coat scarlet. Robb’s spear quivered with the impact, while the wolf staggered away. It was bleeding. Robb moved closer, jerking his knife across the stag’s neck. After slowly placing the animal’s head on the ground, Robb walked away to the stream burbling by their side to wash his hands. 

Moments later, an excited Jon began to shout out. “Father, Bran, come quickly, see what Robb has found!” he cried out, before disappearing again. 

Jory rode up beside him. “Trouble, my lord?” 

“Beyond a doubt,” Ned judged. “Come, let us see what mischief my sons have rooted out now.” He sent his horse into a trot. Jory and Bran and the rest came after. They found Robb on the riverbank north of the bridge, with Jon still mounted beside him. Robb was cradling something in his arm, while the boys talked in hushed, excited voices. 

“Gods!” Jory exclaimed, struggling to keep control of his horse as he reached for his sword. “Robb, get away from it!” he called as his horse reared under him. Robb grinned and looked up from the bundle in his arms. “She can’t hurt you,” he said. “She’s dead, Jory.” At his feet lay a red wolf, different from the grey of earlier. It had a broken antler sticking out of its side but it was felled not by the antler it seemed, but by the spear that stuck out of its side. 

“It was injured,” Jon offered in explanation when he caught his eyes. “I thought it best to put it out of its misery.” 

“It _is_ a direwolf,” Bran proclaimed, this time more confidently. The wolf was bigger than a pony and bigger than every hound in their kennels. “Old Nan says they grow bigger than any other kind...none has been seen for hundreds of years.” 

“Direwolves loose in the realm, after so many years,” muttered Hullen. “I like it not.” 

“It is a sign,” Jory said.

Ned frowned, a tempest of trouble brewing inside him. “This is only a dead animal, Jory,” he said before he noticed the bundle in Robb’s arms. Bran gave a cry of delight and moved closer. The pup was a tiny ball of grey-black fur, its eyes still closed. It nuzzled blindly against Robb’s chest as he cradled it, searching for milk among his leathers, making a sad little whimpery sound. Bran reached out hesitantly.

“Go on,” Robb said to Bran. “You can touch him.” Bran gave the pup a quick nervous stroke, then turned as Jon said, “Here you go.” Jon put a second pup into his arms. “There are five of them.” Bran sat down in the dewy grass and hugged the wolf pup to his face. Ned looked ominously at them, spotting the injured grey wolf of earlier making an appearance. It careened toward them, everyone in their party raised their spears as they stepped back from the wolves. The wolf in question approached its dead mate, let out a mournful howl, took one final look at the pups, and stumbled away with a limp.

“It’ll be dead in no time,” Martyn Cassell commented as they silently watched the injured wolf leave. 

“They’ll be dead soon enough too,” Harwin voiced, pointing at the nursing wolves. 

Bran let out a cry of dismay. 

“We will keep these pups,” Robb announced, in the voice his mother called the lord’s voice. 

“You cannot do that, boy,” said Harwin. “It be a mercy to kill them.” 

Bran only looked at him expectantly with a quivering lip. “Hullen speaks truly, son,” Ned said trying to comfort him. “Better a swift death than a hard one from cold and starvation.”

“No!” Bran looked away. 

“Ser Rodrik’s red bitch whelped again last week,” Robb said. “It was a small litter, only two live pups. She’ll have milk enough.” 

“She’ll rip them apart when they try to nurse,” Farlen, the kennel master, told him. 

“Lord Stark,” Jon said. The boy had a habit of addressing him formally when he had a request to make. It broke his heart to see Lyanna’s boy feel a gulf between them. “There are five pups. Three sons, two daughters. The direwolf is the sigil of your House. Your children were meant to have these pups, my lord.” 

That he did not count himself among them made Ned feel forlorn. “You want no pup for yourself, Jon?” he asked softly, sadness tinging his voice. 

“The direwolf graces the banners of House Stark,” Jon pointed out. “I am no Stark, Father.” He looked down as he said so. Ned regarded him thoughtfully. _You are,_ Ned wanted to tell him. _You have my look...Lyanna’s._ Jon looked more of a Stark than any of Ned’s children besides Arya. 

Robb rushed into the expectant silence. ““I will nurse him myself, Father,” he promised. “I will soak a towel with warm milk, and give him suck from that.” 

“Me too!” Bran echoed.

“Easy to say, and harder to do. I will not have you wasting the servants’ time with this. If you want these pups, you will feed them yourselves. Is that understood?” 

All the children nodded eagerly. How eager they looked almost made him laugh. 

“You must train them as well, Farlen will have nothing to do with these monsters, I promise you that. And the gods help you if you neglect them, or brutalize them, or train them badly. These are not dogs to beg for treats and slink off at a kick. A direwolf will rip a man’s arm off his shoulder as easily as a dog will kill a rat. Are you sure you want this?” 

“Yes, Father,” Bran said.

“Yes,” Robb agreed. 

“The pups may die anyway, despite all you do.” 

“They won’t die,” Robb said. “We won’t _let_ them die.” 

“Keep them, then. Jory, Desmond, gather up the other pups. It’s time we were back to Winterfell.”

They had remounted when Jon stopped them. 

“What is it, Jon?” He asked.

“Can’t you hear it? There,” Jon said. He swung his horse around and galloped back before dismounting. He walked into the long grass before returning with a direwolf as white as snow. “He must have crawled away from the rest,” he declared. 

“Or been driven away,” Ned realised. The wolf opened its eyes. They were as red as the leaves of the weirwood tree. 

The boys’ excitement was contagious, Ned couldn’t help but be happy for them. When they reached the castle grounds, he made his way to godswood, seeking a moment of peace before returning to his solar. 

The hours floated by as he sat in vigil. His thoughts turned to the injured wolf in the wolfswood. He wondered how long it could survive alone in the wilderness. Slowly the heavy feeling made way for ease. Around him wild flowers blossomed, emitting soft scents that reminded him of springs gone by. The golden sun made way for a silver moon. Ned looked up at the obsidian darkness sprinkled as it was with distant stars. He remembered all the long walks he’d taken through Harrenhal’s blooming godswood with Ashara during the previous false spring. Longing battled guilt inside him as he smiled upwards, quivering lip and all. 

He heard her footsteps before he saw Cat appear. Her face was ashen even though it held a kind smile. The guilt only grew inside him and for a moment he glanced at the heart tree’s contorted face wondering if he was being judged that moment for his thoughts. His wife was here, alive, beautiful. There was no woman as beautiful as Cat in the world he thought sometimes. He couldn’t help but return her smile. She _was_ a good woman. 

“Catelyn,” he said, “Where are the children?”

Even as she told him how excited the children were by their wolves, he couldn’t help but note the melancholy in her voice.

“I know how little you like this place,” he interrupted her. “What is it, my lady?” 

Catelyn took his hand. “There was grievous news today, my lord. I did not wish to trouble you until...I am so sorry, my love. Jon Arryn is dead.”

The words floored him. _Jon._

“Jon …” he finally managed to say in a shaking voice. “Is this news certain?” He had spent more years with Jon Arryn than he had with his own father. So much of what he knew about honour, justice, valor, he learnt at the hands of the old Lord of the Eyrie. Jon Arryn had waged a war to protect him. He was a man whose debt Ned could never repay. 

“It was the king’s seal, and the letter is in Robert’s own hand. I saved it for you. He said Lord Arryn was taken quickly. Even Maester Pycelle was helpless, but he brought the milk of the poppy, so Jon did not linger long in pain.”

Ned bit the inside of his cheeks. It would not do to cry in front of his lady. “That is some small mercy, I suppose,” he said. “Your sister…” Cat had mentioned her just the night before. “And Jon’s boy. What word of them?” 

“The message said only that they were well, and had returned to the Eyrie,” Catelyn said. “I wish they had gone to Riverrun instead. The Eyrie is high and lonely, and it was ever her husband’s place, not hers. Lord Jon’s memory will haunt each stone. I know my sister. She needs the comfort of family and friends around her.” 

“Your uncle waits in the Vale, does he not? Jon named him Knight of the Gate, I’d heard.” 

Catelyn nodded. “Brynden will do what he can for her, and for the boy. That is some comfort, but still …” 

“Go to her,” Ned urged. “Take the children. Fill her halls with noise and shouts and laughter. That boy of hers needs other children about him, and Lysa should not be alone in her grief.”

“Would that I could,” Catelyn said. “The letter had other tidings. The king is riding to Winterfell to seek you out.”

Ned’s eyes widened, and a cool gush of hope blew against the fire that burnt inside him. “Robert is coming here?” Robert was the only other person in the world who would understand his pain. Jon had raised them both. Jon had loved them both. Two lost boys. 

When Cat nodded, a smile broke across his face. 

“I knew that would please you,” she said. “Your brother will get to see a wedding _and_ witness a king’s visit.” No king or queen had visited Winterfell since the Good Queen Alysanne’s visit to the castle. 

_Damn him,_ Ned thought, smiling even as he did so. _Damn his royal hide. I’ve missed him._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Varys is still playing hide and seek with me. I’ve decided to give him soliloquys in other chapters instead. Having him here would be too much of a spoiler. 
> 
> This was a quick intro to life in Winterfell, before we begin following the general outline of AGOT with minor differences. With the girls growing up Cat is obviously trying to find good matches for them. I don’t think her difficulty with Arya would ease with age sadly so I imagine things between them will continue to be a bit more terse. 
> 
> I wasn’t going to marry Robb off here but I decided him having a lady might make a difference later. Thank you to Anam Cara for suggesting Wylla in a comment on a previous chapter. I was going to suggest Alys. She has the Stark look and would help legitimise a Tully looking Stark but I don’t think Ned would break an existing engagement just to force his son in with her. 
> 
> Wylla is a top notch Stark cheerleader and her granddaddy is rich. I think it’s a stroke of genius by the way that Davos notes her green hair when she’s making her pro-Stark speech. It’s such a great way of showing Manderly’s true opinions since the merman has green hair. 
> 
> I haven’t decided how Robert will act around Arya. I’m leaning towards making him so drunk he’s forgotten what Lyanna truly looked like. I imagine someone with that kind of obsession would curate an image so perfect actual Lyanna could not measure up next to it. The alternative would be to have a Littlefinger-esque Robert and frankly I could not bring myself to write that and I’ve written an actual Littlefinger chapter. 
> 
> So, assume everything unfolds as it does in canon unless otherwise explicitly stated.
> 
> Now, to plan for a wedding. Everyone should know by now I love tension-filled weddings. I should warn you though there will be no major climax here though lol. Just a lot of awkwardness.


	18. Arya

**Arya**

Arya sought out the godswood. Septa Mordane feared it and her mother only came here when she absolutely had to. It was also the only part of the castle _not_ full of people, banners and expectations. Winterfell’s grey stone walls were draped with banners. The white and grey of House Stark and the blue and green for Manderly were now accompanied by the crowned stag of House Baratheon and the golden lion of Lannister. A king was coming to Winterfell with his queen and Lady Catelyn Stark’s planning for a perfect wedding for her perfect son was compounded by Lady Catelyn Stark’s preparation for a royal visit. That only meant more dress fittings, dance practice, sewing classes, and _endless_ expectations. Everything Arya did had to be perfect, not just her sewing like before - not that that was ever perfect. Now even how she walked and how she lay her cutlery were under scrutiny. And that was without mentioning the new restrictions on her movement. Arya had been banned from leaving the castle after her morning ride with Mycah nearly a month ago. It’s not like she harmed anyone. _They didn’t even want me there._

She was a woman grown now, everyone said so. Even before she flowered Arya had to live under her sister’s shadow and her mother’s expectations but there was a clear distinction between Arya’s life _before_ her flowering and her life _after_ she flowered. _Before_ she was Arya Underfoot free to wander around the castle and Winter town with her brothers and her friends. She’d ride her pony and then her horse freely, racing her brothers - Arya was faster than all of them. She’d go climbing with Bran, he was always better than her at that. She’d sit with her father when his bannermen visited so she could listen to their stories. The little freedoms she had made the parts of her life that she didn’t like all the more palatable. 

_After_ she flowered however she felt like a caged wolf. She wasn’t _allowed_ to meet her actual friends (she had to sneak out to do so). All the girls in their classes were Sansa’s friends, not hers. Arya’s friends were: Palla, Farlen the kennel master's daughter, Mycah, the butcher’s son, Tom Too and Calon, Fat Tom and Cayn’s sons and the girls who worked in Winter Town. They didn’t care that she was was a hopeless lady. They were kind to her anyway. Her only other friends were the Sand Snakes.Obara and Nym taught her how to fight, Princess Arianne and Tyene taught her how to braid her hair so that it wouldn’t get tangled and Sarella and Elia would go exploring with her. Even Prince Oberyn’s only son was kind to her. She liked blue-haired Aegon Sand. He had soft, warm, purple eyes that _looked_ blue but if you stood close enough you could see they were purple. He was patient with her when he taught her how to use a bow and arrow even in her early tries when he must have despaired of her ever hitting the target. Something about him reminded her of Jon. The only problem with her friendship with the Sand Snakes was that they only visited once a year, and never all together. 

Now that she was flowered, Arya wasn’t even allowed to sit with her father’s men when they visited. She used to love listening to their stories and joking with them. She had to sit with their ladies now, which if Arya was honest wasn’t that bad. She _liked_ their wives and daughters. Lady Mormont’s daughters got to wear dresses _and_ weapons. Alys Karstark didn’t have to be burdened with a septa and Wylla who _did_ have one got to dye her hair green _and_ have an opinion about how her life was run. Arya did not. She had to do daily prayers with Septa Mordane - Arya didn’t even believe in the Seven. And since she was so hopeless at everything else she had to stay behind for additional lessons on the ‘womanly arts.’ That meant everything from how to walk properly so she didn’t trip over her overly long gowns to how to curtsy correctly, dance gracefully and speak like a lady. And of course, who could forget all the sewing classes? It’s not like she learnt anything. It was hard to learn anything from someone who only tells you what’s wrong with you. Arya was still hopeless at embroidery compared to Sansa but she _had_ improved. Not because of Septa Mordane but because Princess Elia helped her during a past visit. She learnt more then than in all her lessons with the septa. 

“Arya is not useless,” Elia told Septa Mordane once. “She is just left handed.” She made Arya sit opposite her rather than next to her and told her to follow the way she stitched. As the princess stitched right to left, Arya followed her by stitching left to right. Her stitches weren’t perfect but they were better than anything the septa had ever helped her produce. Princess Elia never mocked her either, she only showed her different ways of doing things. Even her father, who turned a blind eye to what she did sometimes, still expected her to become a perfect lady. The Sand Snakes and Aegon Sand didn’t care whether she was a lady or not and neither did Jon. Jon was the only person in the castle who loved her for true. Bran didn’t understand what it was like for her, he got to do whatever he wanted. Robb and Sansa thought her life would be easier if she did as she was told. That was easy for them to say. The two of them were the perfect little lordling and lady. Robb would inherit Winterfell one day and Sansa had never done anything wrong in her life. 

“I thought I’d find you here.” 

Arya jumped. She didn't hear Sansa come up behind her. 

“I haven’t done anything wrong today,” Arya said defensively. 

Sansa pressed her lips together in the way their mother always did when she was displeased. “Lord Manderly has sent a raven to say they will be arriving at week’s end.” 

That was hardly news. Lords and ladies had already begun pouring into Winterfell as it was. “Why don’t you go and tell Robb? It’s not like _I’m_ marrying Wylla.” Arya just wanted to be left alone. 

“Mother says you have to practice your dancing _with_ your dress for the wedding so that you don’t embarrass yourself by tripping over. _I’ve_ already perfected my dance,” she added airily. 

Arya huffed and followed Sansa into the castle. There was less than a year between them in age but Arya could never match up to her sister. Sansa could sew and dance and sing. She wrote poetry. She knew how to dress. She played the high harp and the bells. Worse, she was beautiful. Sansa had gotten their mother’s fine high cheekbones and the thick auburn hair of the Tullys. Her mother often said that Sansa was already growing to become even more beautiful than she was and Lady Catelyn Stark was the most beautiful woman Arya knew. 

When Arya was little she had wondered whether she was her father’s bastard like Jon. The two of them were the only children who looked like him, the rest of her siblings had the easy smiles of the Tullys with fire in their hair. Arya's hair was a lusterless brown, and her face was long and solemn. Jeyne Poole called her _Horseface_ and Sansa said she had a face best viewed in the dark. Her mother said she _could_ be pretty if she made more of an effort - which was just her way of telling her she wasn’t - and her father said she looked like her aunt Lyanna. Lyanna was beautiful. Arya had seen enough of herself in the looking glass to know that she was not. 

They cut across the courtyard and went up the covered bridge below where her brother’s laughed and practiced with Ser Rodrik. 

“Shoulders back, Arya! Raise your chin - not that high! Like this. And keep your back straight.” Arya followed the septa’s instruction, gliding in the dress and trying to be graceful while shy yet merry. It was stupid. Everyone would be drunk by the time dancing began and if Arya knew the Umbers at all, they’d pick her up and spin her around rendering all these steps completely and utterly redundant. 

“Enough,” the septa scowled. “Come and sit, let’s see your latest stitches. And sit like you walk. Keep your chin up and your back straight.” Arya had only managed to sit before the septa reminded her “Unless you’re using your hands for something, keep them folded in your lap. Do not fidget.” 

Arya bit her lip to try and stop herself from crying. She felt the hot tears well up in her eyes but she was determined not to let them see her cry. She focused on stabbing the needle through the cloth. She’d much rather stab something else. “I thought you said we’re stitching,” Arya said sardonically.

“That tongue of yours-”  
“Will get me in trouble, I know.” 

The septa was standing over Sansa as she stitched, cooing over her perfect student. The perfect student in question blushed prettily at all the praise. Beside her Jeyne Poole focused on her own stitches and Beth Cassel sat with them. Arya sat alone. As usual. The septa walked away from them for a moment and Arya noticed the three of them giggling over something. 

“What are you talking about?” she demanded to know. 

They all just looked at her giggling with each other.

“Tell me.” 

“Mother says the King is travelling to Winterfell to ask Father to be his Hand.” Arya heard the same, the King’s late Hand had once raised the king and her father in the Vale. With him dead now, their mother thought the king was granting their family the highest honour by travelling all this way to ask their father to be Hand. 

“Mother also says,” Sansa said blushing, “that he’ll be accompanied by the prince...she thinks that we might be... well suited.” 

“How does she know that? She’s never even met him.” 

“You’re just jealous that Sansa might be queen,” Jeyne interjected as if someone was speaking to her. The steward’s daughter acted more like Sansa’s sister and protector than Arya. “Let’s just hope you don’t do something embarrassing during this visit. If you do so in front of so many people they won’t have any choice but to marry you off to some minor lord who won’t have any say in whether he marries you... horseface and all.”

“Jeyne,” Sansa said. “That’s not nice.” There was no force to Sansa’s words. There never was. She only reprimanded Jeyne’s worst barbs because that was what was expected of a lady. The only time Jeyne truly minded her words were when the Sand Snakes were around. She also would never speak to Arya so rudely around any lords or ladies. 

Irritation pricked at Arya but she wouldn’t let them see her cry. “You’re absolutely right,” she said instead. “I _am_ hopeless...it’s just a shame that _you_ don’t have any brothers, Jeyne. After all, House Poole is the smallest of small houses. I mean, you don’t even have a castle. They’d have to keep me here, in _my_ castle if they forced your brother to marry me.” Arya smirked.. “That _would_ serve me well. Perhaps he’d even have to take _my_ name...after all Stark is a more powerful name than Poole.” Arya knew it was an unkind thing to say, Vayon Poole, her father’s steward was a good man but no one got under Arya’s skin like Jeyne Poole. 

Sourfaced Jeyne only scowled in response. 

“But don’t let me crush your hopes,” Arya continued, “perhaps the king will have some hedge knight or other who might spare you a thought. Of course you’d have to trudge along after him as he went from lord to lord.” Arya thought a life on the road might be quite fun but it was Jeyne’s idea of a nightmare. 

“If _I_ get betrothed to the prince,” Sansa said in defence of her friend, “Jeyne would be my lady-in-waiting and I would make sure she got a gallant match to suit her beauty.” Sourfaced Jeyne smirked at that. 

“That’s only _if_ the prince is interested in you,” Arya told her. “King’s Landing is not Winterfell where everyone acts as if the sun shines out of your arse.” They all gasped at her words.

“Arya Stark,” the septa screeched. “A lady does not use such coarse speech. Apologise to your sister.” 

“I was only telling her the truth. Princess Elia says court is always full of pretty women. Sansa wouldn’t be the only pretty girl he’s seen.” 

“Poor Princess Elia,” Sansa sighed, “She would say that. Prince Rhaegar crowned Aunt Lyanna as his Queen of Love and Beauty. But Rhaegar was a terrible man, the gallant prince Joffrey wouldn’t be anything like him.” 

“How do you know that?” 

“I just do,” Sansa declared with an air of certainty. Arya only rolled her eyes. There was more to life than marriage. 

“Girls,” their mother said as she glided into the room. “I wanted to see how you were getting on.” 

“Not well at all. Not well at all,” the Septa announced. “Arya insists on using the most unbecoming of language for a lady. She was quite horrid to Sansa.” 

Catelyn Stark pressed her lips into a line. “What did you say to your sister, Arya?” 

Arya clenched her teeth together. Sansa and Jeyne Poole could be horrid to her but no one ever caught them. “I told her, the sun does not shine out of her arse.” 

“We were talking about the king's upcoming visit. I only told Arya about what you said about me and the prince. She said the prince wouldn’t notice me because court is full of beautiful ladies.” 

Their mother sighed. “That was not nice of you Arya. Your sister is the best match for the prince. The king is your father’s best friend-”

“If he is, why have we never met him?” 

“Arya. Enough of this wilful behaviour.”

“I only asked a question,” Arya muttered under her breath. 

“It is high time for you to be betrothed. How will we ever find you a betrothal if you keep acting this way?”

“Between my horseface and my lack of courtesies, mother, I believe you might have to just keep me here.”

“Enough!” Catelyn Stark said. “What do you think you will achieve by being so wilful? It will only mean you end up making an unworthy match.” She sighed loudly. “All eyes will be on you as the groom’s sisters and with the king arriving well...there will be even more scrutiny. With so many people arriving, this wedding will be your greatest chance at securing a betrothal.” Arya wanted the floor to swallow her. She didn’t _want_ to marry. She knew she would have to one day...she just wanted to postpone it for as long as she could. Wylla was six-and-ten and only now was she betrothed. “You will have to be on your best behaviour if we’re to get a match for you.” Both Sansa and Jeyne shared a smile between them at those words. Arya wanted to disappear. _I won’t cry._

“Now... how are you getting on besides this...incident _?_ ” 

“Arya must concentrate more on her manners,” Septa Mordane decided to inform Lady Stark. She had a habit of speaking about Arya as if she was not in the room. “This morning she did not wipe her spoon clean after using it _and_ I had to tell her to keep both feet on the floor when she was reaching for the water. I wish she could be more attentive about such things...like Sansa.” Sansa bloomed under the praise, smug Jeyne smirked some more, Beth did not look up from her stitches. Arya clenched her fists until her nails bit crescents into her palm. She would not cry. She would not. 

Her mother tutted. “There’s still time to remember these things. If we’re lucky you still have a few days before the king and his party arrive.” Arya did not bother to respond. It would not serve any purpose. 

When her mother left the room. Arya asked to be excused. The septa refused to give her leave. “You will have to re-do your stitches. _These_ are terrible.” The rest of them laughed at her as if they had any skills beyond stitching that were actually useful. 

She felt her thundering heart beat pound loudly in her ears. Her body tingled and her eyes blurred with unshed tears. She had to leave. Arya dropped the stupid cloth and marched out. 

“Arya!” the Septa called out after her. “Come back here right now or I will tell _both_ your lady mother and lord father.” 

“Don’t forget to send a raven to the king and queen as well!” Arya shouted back. She hated them all. 

Nymeria was waiting for her at the bottom of the base of the covered bridge’s stairs. She leaped up to Arya the moment she saw her. Arya smiled for a moment. The wolf pup loved her, even if no one else did. They did most things together, and she even slept in her room. If Mother had not forbidden it, she would gladly have taken the wolf with her to needlework. Let Septa Mordane complain about her stitches then. Arya had named her after the warrior-Princess of the Rhoynar Nymeria of Ny Sar. Princess Elia had once told her the story of how Princess Nymeria had saved her people from the wroth of the dragonlords. No one cared about Nymeria’s many husbands. They only remembered one of them and even then, her name stood alone. 

Arya stepped into the stables with Nymeria, going from horse to horse, humming softly as she patted them. They didn’t care about her stitches either. Her favourite was a grey palfrey she was yet to name. She was still young and temperamental but it was nothing Arya couldn’t handle.

“Saddle her for me,” Arya ordered Harwin in her strictest voice when he came in. “And, please, be quick about it.”

“We both know you’re not allowed outside the castle ground little lady,” he said laughing at her. It only made her angrier as she stomped out. Nymeria trailed behind her. Arya _had_ to get out of the castle. It felt like a prison to her. 

It took her hours to manage her escape. She stole some bread and cheese from Gage in the kitchens, took her heaviest cloak, and concealed her dagger under her clothing. She left out of the Hunter’s Gate when the guards were being changed and ran in the direction of the wolfswood. They wouldn’t find her there until she _decided_ to return home. She’d be in lots of trouble when she returned she knew but she couldn’t bring herself to care. The worst they could do is lock her in her room and they wouldn’t do that for too long...the king was coming and Catelyn Stark wouldn’t have anyone know she had an uncontrollable daughter. _No._ That would suggest she was capable of failure.

Arya felt fearless next to Nymeria who didn’t let her leave alone. She walked and walked and walked far into the wolfwood, parts of which were so dark because they were covered by a canopy of newly flowered trees. Nymeria kept up with her, shoving her now and again. “I know _you_ love me,” Arya told her as she tickled her between the ears. It felt good to have someone who cared about her. Her brothers spent so much time with each other now and they didn’t leave much space for her. 

These days Jon spent all _his_ time alone and angry with everyone. Arya tried to find out what was wrong with him but he was terse even with her. That hurt more than anything. Jon was the only person who always had time for her. She tried to be there for him but he wouldn’t let her... as if he was annoyed by her.

She felt her eyes glaze with a glassy layer of tears. Jon had never been distant from her. She felt her tears drip from her eyes when she blinked, sliding down her cheeks. She bit her lip in an attempt to hold back the tears that had been threatening to spill out of her eyes all day. Before she knew it she was crying hard, her chest grew tight as bile rose in her throat.

Nymeria rubbed herself against her leg whimpering against her. Her only friend. Arya knelt down and hid her face against Nymeria’s soft and rough coat. Nymeria began to growl. At first Arya ignored it but the more she growled, the more reason Arya found to turn around to see what she was growling at. When Arya did she noticed the biggest wolf she had ever seen. Nym left Arya’s side. 

“Nymeria,” Arya called out. “Come back here!” The wolf ignored her. She never had before. “Nymeria, please!” she added. By now Nymeria was running to the big wolf. Arya was frozen. She was sure it would kill her small pup. Nymeria was already of a size with most of Farlen’s hounds but she was tiny next to this wolf. It was bigger than all the ponies in their stables.

But it didn’t kill her. Nymeria rubbed against the wolf, whimpering quietly all while the wolf returned her sounds. _She knows it._ That was when Arya noticed a slight limp in its stride. It was the wolf her brothers told her about. The one that was fighting the stag Robb felled. 

Nymeria bounded back in Arya’s direction with the big wolf trailing behind her. For some reason a calmness washed over Arya. She did not feel afraid. Feeling afraid wouldn’t have made a difference anyway, nor would the dagger hidden in her clothes. It would only take one snap of the wolf’s jaws to end her life. She probably wouldn’t feel it and it might just give House Stark a tragic solution to the liability she had become. 

The wolf only nudged her hand. Shakily, she raised it to run her hand through it’s dirty fur coat and it let her, laying its head in her lap after a while. Arya felt powerful for a moment and couldn’t help but begin laughing. Nymeria nuzzled against her side. Both wolves warmed her as the sun began to set. Arya wasn’t sure when she fell asleep. She only heard people shouting her name. Both wolves strained their ears in the direction of the sounds. It didn’t take them long to find her but Arya didn’t want to return home yet. That’s when she decided to do something stupid. She climbed on the big wolf’s back and held on and as it ran away with her. It wasn’t as fast as any of her horses since it’s injured leg slowed it down but it did put some distance between her and her pursuers. She _would_ go back just not yet. She stepped off the wolf’s back after a while, “Thank you,” she told him gratefully. She was just about to climb up an oak when she heard Jon’s voice. 

“What in seven hells do you think you’re doing Arya?” 

“What’s it to you?” she asked him. “It’s not like you actually _speak_ to me anymore.” 

“What are you talking about...Your mother has sent out half of Winterfell’s guards to look for you,” he told her impatiently. “She has guests Arya! We have to return you home before _they_ notice....Why are you even hiding out here?” 

“I’m not hiding.”

“No? Why are you climbing up the oak then?” He waved his torch in her direction. 

“How did you find me?” 

“Ghost must have picked up Nymeria’s scent. Arya, why are you running away? You must have heard us-” he swallowed the rest of his sentence when Ghost made his way to the great wolf behind her. 

“Come here.” 

“Why?” She turned her eyes to the wolf who was now beside her and smiled. “He won’t hurt me.” If he was going to hurt her, he would have when she fell asleep but he didn’t. 

“You don’t know that, Arya,” Jon said as he walked over to her, not taking his eyes off the wolf. It made Arya feel brave. He was scared of the wolf. She was not. Jon wrapped his arms around her, pulling her behind him. “Let’s go home, Arya.”

“I don’t want to go back.”

“No?” he asked with a smile when they were further away from the big wolf. It was the first time he smiled at her in days. His grey eyes looked silver against the torchlight. “Where will you go instead?” Arya bit her lip. It was a good question. She hadn’t planned on running away so she had no destination in mind. She didn’t even have any clothes but the ones on her back. For a moment she thought about running away to Deepwood Motte but they’d only return her to Winterfell _and_ it would only embarrass her mother. “Perhaps some crofter or other will take me in.” The wolfswood was full of them. 

He looked more amused than annoyed by her answer. “And why would he do that?”

“I can help him hunt or clean his hut for him.”

“Are you looking for a husband, little sister?” He grinned at her. 

“No.” Arya scowled. “Only somewhere they won’t care about whether I wipe my spoon clean after I eat or lift my feet off the ground when I reach for something.”

“What happened?” he asked her, his voice was soft. He pulled her into a hug. So she mumbled everything that happened against his chest, crying freely as she did so. “I don't even eat much and I don’t take up much space. I’m good at sums too. I could help Vayon Poole just so they would let me stay.” Jon listened to her as she ranted. He never judged her or thought her weak when she cried. Even now when he wouldn’t tell her what was wrong with him, he still let her share her troubles. 

“Will you tell me what’s wrong with you?” she asked him after a while. They sat down in the dewy grass now. Jon had planted his torch into the ground. Their wolves ran away with the larger wolf and had not yet returned. Arya didn’t hear anyone else call out her name. 

“Who said there’s anything wrong with me?”

“You-“

“Arya.” Arya closed her eyes and sighed. She knew that voice. It belonged to her father. She would rather be tortured on the rack than face the disappointment she knew was etched on his face. Jon stood immediately but Arya took her time. She didn’t want to see his face. At least her mother would tell her off. Her father would only look sadly at her and tell her she must stop her wilfulness.

“Return to the castle, Jon,” her father said. Arya saw Jory and his father and Harwin and his stand behind her father along with Farlen and his hounds. Jon looked for Ghost for a moment but did as he was told. The pups had taken to leaving the castle lately so it wasn’t unusual for them to leave and return. Her father waited until they were alone before he spoke to her. He seemed more sad than angry. That made Arya feel even worse. She felt the tears sting her eyes even before her lips quivered. Her father sat where Jon had a few moments before. 

“Arya, child,” he sighed. “What am I to do with you?”

“If I was a man you could send me to the wall.” She immediately regretted her words. The alternative for her was to be sent off to the Silent Sisters. She didn’t think she could survive never speaking again. 

“Come here,” he replied instead, tapping the ground beside him. “Your mother is worried sick.”

Arya bit her lip. “I was going to return. I just needed to leave and then I fell asleep…” _and then I ran away._

“You fell asleep in the woods?”

“I had Nymeria with me and the other wolf.”

“The other wolf?”

“I think he’s her father.”

“Arya.” Her father sighed again. “That wolf could kill you! Would you deprive me of a child by your recklessness.”

“He wouldn’t!” Why wouldn’t anyone believe her?

“Your mother and the septa have told me about your behaviour today-“

“What did they tell you?”

“You used some unkind words against your sister. Arya-“

“Of course.” Arya scoffed bitterly. “ _I’m_ always the aggressor. Septa Mordane only ever picks on me. I hate her! And I hate-“

“That’s enough.” Her father’s voice was curt and hard. “The septa is doing no more than is her duty, though gods know you have made it a struggle for the poor woman. Your mother and I have charged her with the impossible task of making you a lady.”

“I don’t want to be a lady!” Arya flared. “Not if it means becoming anything like that stupid septa! She doesn’t notice when her perfect little students do something wrong. She doesn’t care that my stitches are crooked because _she_ doesn’t teach me correctly. They all laugh at me in her stupid classes.” Arya was crying again but she couldn’t find it in her to care. “They call me horseface and neigh when I walk past. They laugh at everything I do. Mother only cares about Sansa and _you_ only care about your sons these days. And I-“ Arya sobbed. “No one cares about anything that _I’m_ good at. Only the things I’m not good at. All everyone seems to care about is a match for me that might make everyone else happy. What about my happiness? None of you care about me. Maybe if that wolf did you all the favour of eating me you could all continue with your lives!” Arya was breathing heavily. Anger surged through her body. 

She noticed tears in her father’s eyes then. She had never seen him cry. “That’s not true,” he told her, “I do care for you, sweet one. I care for you so much.” For a moment she thought she heard him swallow a sob. He hugged her then. “Your mother only wants the best for you.”

“It doesn’t sound that way. She spends _all_ her time with Sansa. She sends Sansa’s maid away so she can brush her hair. Why should she bother with the ugly daughter? She hasn’t touched my hair for years. Do you know who taught me how to braid my hair? Princess Arianne and Tyene! Not mother. Mother coos at everything Sansa does and scowls at me. Sometimes I wish _I_ was a bastard too.”

“Arya-“

“If I was Ashara Dayne’s child like Jon then at least I’d understand _why_ she disliked me so!”

“Arya!” Her father’s eyes widened. “What did you just say?”

Arya wiped her eyes. “That if I was a bastard-“

“Where did you hear that name?” Her father’s look was severe. Arya bit her lip. She’d heard the story from Arianne years ago but since it made her father so angry she thought it best to stay quiet. “I..I can’t remember.” Something clouded her father’s expression. It was as if the colour had drained from his face. 

“Was she really Jon’s mother?” she found herself asking against all good sense. “He has wanted to know his mother’s name for years, father.”

“Look at me,” he finally said when the shock wore off, “I don’t know where you heard that name but I will _never_ hear you say it again.” There was an angry edge to his voice. “She is _not_ Jon’s mother. You will never repeat that name again!” 

Arya shrunk back from him, fearing her father for the first time. She gulped. Her father had never scared her. He had never growled like this either. The anger seemed to leave him as soon as it came. Now he just looked sad.

“Arya,” he said finally, “You cannot continue acting like this.”

“Fine,” she mumbled. No one ever tried to understand her anyway. She bit her lip until it hurt. Not that it stopped her from crying again. She wiped off the tears angrily. “We can go now,” she declared red-faced and angry at herself for her weakness and everyone else as well. _I should have run away_. 

“No.” 

“What?”

“I want to understand,” he said. “Why you think I don’t care.”

Arya sat back down and began to tell him how unfair it was that she was always compared to Sansa. “Bran gets to do whatever he wants. He knows he’ll be Robb’s bannerman one day but no one cares what he does with his time. I, on the other hand, can’t do anything right. Even the way I sit when I eat is criticised. I don’t even believe in the Seven. Why do I need a septa?”

Her father only hugged her but Arya found she couldn’t stop. “All _you_ see when you look at me is Aunt Lyanna, mother wants me to be Sansa, Sansa wants me to be a mirror of her, everyone wants me to be something I’m not. I’m Arya, father. Not Lyanna or Catelyn or Sansa. I’m my own person. I’m not a horrible person.” She sobbed. “If I was, more people would say I was...Right?”

Tears coursed down her father’s face. “You are the furthest thing from horrible,” he told her. He leaned forward to her, placing a hand over her shoulder. “I am so proud of you. I am proud of how much you care about others. I am proud of how you stand up for what you believe in. I love you, Arya.” He gave her a shaky, teary smile. “I love you _so_ much.” 

A smile found its way to her face. 

“As does your mother, Arya. She loves you so much.”

“She-“

Her father raised his hand. “I believe I know, Arya. I’ve been married to her for seventeen years. She loves you so much. She even loves your wilfulness. Your mother is stubborn too. She just knows that this world does not let girls be what they want. That’s why she tries so hard with you. She wants you to have a happy future.”

“But-“

“And I-“ he interjected, “worry for you, Arya. Because my sister was just like you. She had a wildness in her. ‘The wolf blood,’ my father used to call it. Lyanna had a touch of it, and my brother Brandon more than a touch. It brought them both to an early grave. I want to protect you from that but I want you to know happiness too. I don’t want to fail you,” he admitted, “like I failed them.”

“What do you mean?” Her father rarely spoke of his siblings, beyond telling her that she reminded him of Lyanna. 

“I will not burden you with all my sins,” he mumbled cryptically. “Know this, my dear one,” he continued in a surer voice, “I love you and I can only apologise for not showing you I do.”

“I know you love me,” Arya said. She did. Her father loved her more than her mother. It’s not that Catelyn Stark _hated_ her. She just didn’t take time to know her. Arya threw her arms around her father. “I know,” she said again. “I just...I’m sorry.”

They sat there for a while longer. Her father told her more about her aunt Lyanna. More than ever before. 

He even asked her again never to mention Ashara Dayne’s name again. That only made her surer that Arianne was correct when she said her father had once loved her. “She was my friend,” he said. “And then she died but she wasn’t Jon’s mother. Mention of his mother upsets yours. Please, do not make mention of this again.” He sounded sad as he said so. 

They only stood to leave the forest when the torch began to die down. Ghost and Nymeria returned then. Arya heard a distant howl as she climbed up on her father’s horse. Nymeria and Ghost answered it. 

They were still outside the castle walls when they heard trumpets blast from the inner castle. Arya flinched and turned back to her father. He only picked up the pace. By the time they rode through the castle from the North Gate, Arya could see a line of guests at the mouth of the East Gate from where visitors poured in like a river of gleaming gold, silver and polished steel which glinted against the torch light. Arya turned back to her father when she noticed the crowned stag of Baratheon. 

Everyone was still on bended knee when they rode into the courtyard. A fat crowned man walked towards them. _The king._ He strode purposefully toward Arya when she dismounted with a look of astonishment on his face. He stopped just in front of her putting two fingers under her chin so she had to look up at him. 

“Lyanna?” he said sadly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So erm, our girl Arya is not in a good place as you can tell. I presume she’s not always in this mindspace but I think all the pressure is getting to her :( Let’s hope this conversation with Ned helps things along... 
> 
> We’ll explore why Jon is being a little distant soon.. 
> 
> Credit to @SailorSaigas for the Jon doodle lmao. It made me laugh so hard - thank you so much for putting it together.
> 
> Arya decided 1+1 = 5 with N+A=J but I mean there’s got to be some truth in every rumour right? Lmao.
> 
> As for Robert...perhaps he’ll decide Arya was the kid he could have had. 
> 
> Yes I know we’re nearly at 100,000 words and still no Jon/Arya. I mean...perhaps we’ll get some romance before 200,000 words??


	19. Jon

**Jon**

They made Arya sit between the bloated red-faced king, already sweating through his silks, and his pouty-lipped son on the high table. Between Arya, who could not deign to hide her aversion, the duck-lipped prince who considered the Hall with a disdainful look and Sansa who sat furthest away from them and whose jaw was clenched so tight Jon thought she would break her teeth, he wasn’t sure who wore the most rancid scowl. From all the way back here with the squires and staff, Jon had a good vantage point to judge them all; granted, he was already well in his cups - the non-bastard children at the high tables would only be allowed a cup of wine at most (with the exception of Robb) but the bastard of Winterfell had no such restrictions. _The small joys of bastardy._

Father sat next to the queen, looking uncomfortable. Lady Stark couldn’t take her icy eyes away from Arya but was too far away to say anything to her. Arya had escaped earlier to the visiting Mormont girls and Alys Karstark where she looked happier and laughed but Lady Stark considered that an insult to the royals. Robb was sitting at the front as well. The heir to Winterfell was being hand fed a tart by his green-haired bride whose grandfather paid for much of the festivities leading up to the wedding. A Manderly was wedding a Stark after all. The king had a serving wench on his lap - the king, _the peerless Robert Baratheon,_ was the greatest disappointment of all to Jon. Bran, who could make conversation with anyone, was laughing with the fat prince Tommen. The Princess Myrcella sat with her uncles: the Kingslayer and the Imp - two men as different as only a soiled, storied knight and a dwarf could be. Uncle Benjen finally managed to lift the look of discomfort from Father when he moved beside him. Even Theon Greyjoy was up there. The ever smirking ward. Rickon, at five, was up way past his bedtime and was dozing off in his seat. Jon thought if Lady Stark spent less time grimacing she would have noticed him. But in the end...on second thoughts, he decided the honour of who wore the best glower belonged to the Queen, Cersei Lannister. He could see through her ever-fading, painted smile. The king and his party had been in Winterfell for just over a day. A day of which he had spent regaling anyone who would listen with tales of how much he loved his lost love, their aunt Lyanna...more oft than not in full hearing of the queen. Every mention of Lyanna Stark, Jon noticed, prompted wounded looks in both his father and uncle - looks they wore almost permanently because Lyanna’s name was seldom far from the king’s ugly mouth. Were he not so otherwise loathsome, Jon might have respected his undying love for Lyanna Stark. That he was proud to love her was a marked distinction from his own father who refused to ever speak of Jon’s mother. _That’s assuming he loved her,_ Jon thought bitterly. 

So strong was Robert Baratheon’s longing that he had decided that Arya looked so much like his lost love that any child they might have had would have looked like her. As such, he declared her an honourary daughter. She was the daughter of his brother in all but blood after all. Half a day ago, Jon might have said that was a touching thought. The king gave her all the attention in the world. But now, four hours into the welcoming feast, Arya remained as forgotten as his true children. The king drank and dribbled and ogled serving woman after serving woman without any shame. 

On and on the feasting went. By now they had cleared some of the tables at the front to make way for dancing - as if people could walk straight. They could hardly do so back here but Jon thought the highborns may have other standards. They had a king to impress after all. As a bastard, Jon had no such hopes. He was free to drink himself into a stupor and that’s what he would do. 

“How much have you had to drink?”How she snuck up on him he could not say. The wine had clearly dulled his senses. Then again, she was Arya Underfoot. 

“You should return to your seat, Arya.” She ignored his words, plopping herself next to him and scratching Ghost between the ears. His pup was devouring a chicken beneath the table. 

“It’s not fair,” she scowled, downing _his_ wine.“Ghost gets to be here and Nymeria is locked away in the kennels.”

Jon took back his cup from her. “I sit with the squires, little sister, and you with a king.”

“Not like I want to! I’d much rather sit here with you!”

For a moment that made him smile...it almost made him forget that they were not the same...that they could never be as close as before. “ _Unlike you, my daughter has prospects,”_ Lady Stark told him a month ago when he returned from a ride with Arya, “ _and she will never live to her potential if she keeps trailing after you. Leave her alone. Do not sentence her to a life of loneliness just because you choose to do nothing with your life.”_

Lady Catelyn Stark regarded her children with eyes the colour of a summer sky. For Jon, she reserved only the icy looks of a tempestuous sea. Her words that day were just as cold. _You have no future, bastard. Leave my child alone_ is what she wanted him to hear. That and _disappear._

Ever since they were children, there was an unstated rivalry between him and Robb, Sansa only ever called him half-brother since bastard was too rude to use, Bran loved him as did Rickon but no one showered him with love as much as Arya. It had always been the two of them, the misfits who found respite with only each other. But ever since that conversation, Lady Stark watched him with even closer attention - something Jon didn’t think possible since he was sure she already begrudged him every smile that ever graced his face and ever morsel of food that passed his lips. Staying away from Arya however, was almost impossible. She’d seek him out in the way she always did and where Arya came Catelyn Stark’s eyes followed. 

“I hear you will be wed soon, little sister,” he said, breaking the silence between them. “Best get used to sitting next to the king. You’ll be his daughter soon.” The king had spoken loudly of joining the lines of Baratheon and Stark as they should have been. And while he did not say _who_ would be marrying his girly son, anyone with eyes could see he wanted the little Lyanna for his son. _Shame your son looks nothing like you,_ Jon thought of the king’s desire to recreate a past he still mourned. He heard Sansa wailing earlier that day - she had been waxing lyrical about her gallant prince for nigh on a month. Arya raged at their father, promising to run away. There were many times Jon had seen their father deal with Arya’s tantrums but never had he seen a look of such horror cross his face at Arya’s words. She would do it, Jon knew and so, it seemed, did their father. 

Arya put down his cup and twisted her lips in disgust. “I will never marry a stupid prince,” she vehemently declared.“And you-“

“I don’t think you should be so sure about that little lady,” their uncle laughed, ruffling her hair. “Is this one of the direwolves I’ve heard so much of?” he asked, sitting down with them. 

“Arya!” Catelyn Stark called out in her ice-laden voice. “What are you doing here?” She painted on a smile, the moment she saw Uncle Ben. “Go back to your seat.”

“Mother.” Arya belched, then giggled. “I believe I am well and truly drunk.” This time she hiccuped before another giggle escaped her. Jon might have laughed if Lady Stark did not turn her icy gaze at him. Of course, _she’d_ find a way to blame him. 

“Come with me,” she instructed, pulling Arya up by her arm, “you need to sleep before you embarrass yourself.” Arya turned back to him, as she staggered away, sending him a wink and a smirk. She was not drunk at all, merely escaping her confines. Yet even that was not enough to warm the ice that settled in his veins. Lady Stark would always blame him...and Arya would always seek him out. He had no escape. 

Benjen watched Arya walk away with a sad smile. His face brightened with amusement when he turned his eyes to Ghost. “A very quiet wolf.”

“He’s not like the others,” Jon said. “He never makes a sound. That’s why I named him Ghost. That, and because he’s white. The others are all dark, grey or black.”

“There are still direwolves beyond the Wall. We hear them on our rangings.” Benjen Stark gave Jon a long look. “Don’t you usually eat at the table with your brothers?” 

“Most times,” Jon answered in a flat voice. “But tonight Lady Stark thought it might give insult to the royal family to seat a bastard among them.” 

“I see.” His uncle glanced over his shoulder at the raised table at the far end of the hall. “My brother does not seem very festive tonight.”

Jon could see that himself. A blind man could see Ned Stark cut an uncomfortable figure on the high table next to the ice-sculpture queen and fondling king. Jon shared in a whisper to Uncle Benjen why he thought the queen was so angry. 

Benjen studied Jon carefully before remarking, “You don’t miss much, do you, Jon? We could use a man like you on the Wall.” 

Jon swelled with pride - it was rare for someone to recognise worth in him. “Robb is a stronger lance than I am, but I’m the better sword, and Hullen says I sit a horse as well as anyone in the castle.”

“Notable achievements.” 

“Take me with you when you go back to the Wall,” Jon said in a sudden rush. “Father will give me leave to go if you ask him, I know he will.”

Uncle Benjen made excuses about why that was such a bad idea - all of which culminated in the fact that Jon didn’t know what he would be giving up. _As if I’m a half-wit. A bastard can be honourable too!_ Jon hated that everyone expected bastards to be treacherous and good for nothing - everyone apart from the Dornish it would seem. Sometimes Jon wished he’d been born in Dorne, a Sand and not a Snow. There, he might have known true love and wouldn’t have had to scramble to find a future on a frozen Wall because he had no other future ahead of him. Oberyn Martell moved mountains for his bastards. The worst kept secret was that his daughter Sarella had gone to study at the citadel. A woman. At the citadel. 

“Jon,” his uncle sighed softly, “If you knew what the oath would cost you, you might be less eager to pay the price, son.”

Jon felt anger rise inside him. “I’m not your son!” Benjen Stark stood up. “More’s the pity.” He put a hand on Jon’s shoulder. “Come back to me after you’ve fathered a few bastards of your own, and we’ll see how you feel.” 

Jon trembled with rage. He’d never consign a child to the life he lived. “I will never father a bastard. Never!” He spat it out like venom before he staggered out of the room, sending a serving girl and a flagon of wine flying to the floor. Laughter erupted all around him, the stupid fool that he was. Scalding tears flowed down his cheeks. He wiped angrily at them, hating the world and himself. What kind of grown man cried? 

If Uncle Benjen’s words had made him livid, Tyrion Lannister’s words sobered him, almost as if he wrung the drink out of every pore in Jon’s body. 

“Let me give you some counsel, bastard,” Lannister said. “Never forget what you are, for surely the world will not. Make it your strength. Then it can never be your weakness. Armour yourself in it, and it will never be used to hurt you.” 

Jon was in no mood for anyone’s counsel. “What do you know about being a bastard?” No one was kicking _him_ out of his father’s home. 

“All dwarfs are bastards in their father’s eyes.”

“You are your mother’s trueborn son of Lannister.” 

“Am I?” the dwarf replied, sardonic. 

“Do tell my lord father. My mother died birthing me, and he’s never been sure.” 

“I don’t even know who my mother was,” Jon said. When he was a boy, he used to wish Elia Martell was his mother. She’d read him stories, bring him gifts and sew him cloaks. One time she embroidered the inside of one with a tiny blue flower and a wolf, another year a golden harp. One time he even convinced himself she _was_ his mother. His father had spent a long time in Dorne after the war after all. But so did Lord Glover and he was the one married to her. 

“Some woman, no doubt,” the Imp said. “Most of them are.” He favored Jon with a rueful grin. 

“Remember this, boy. All dwarfs may be bastards, _yet not all bastards need be dwarfs.”_ And with that he turned and sauntered back into the feast, whistling a tune. 

From a corner near the stables came the sound of a man and woman swiving. A lot of that seemed to be happening all around the castle. Many bastards would be born following this wedding. An irony if ever there was one. 

On his way to his rooms he came across Lady Stark. Jon tried his best to fade into the shadows but she caught him anyway. 

“What good are you?” She pursed her lips as she regarded him from feet to head and back down again. “I know bastards are black of heart but I thought even you would care for your father’s daughter’s image.”

“My lady-“

Catelyn Stark raised a hand. “Look at you,” she spat, “embarrassingly drunk off others’ coin. Robb and his children will inherit Winterfell, my daughters will marry well, as will Bran and Rickon when their times come. Do you intend to live off handouts for the rest of _your_ life? _”_ She walked away from him shaking her head in disgust. “Unbelievable,” he heard her mutter. 

Jon’s chin trembled as if he were still a child of six realising he had no mother to turn to. When Robb hurt himself he had a mother who ran to him. When he distinguished himself in the yard he had a mother who cheered him. Even now, he had a mother who cared for his interests. They all did. All but him. Tears burst forth like water from a dam. He was truly alone. He belonged nowhere. He lived off the sweat of others. He was a Snow, of no import to anyone, anywhere. He was merely a stain on Eddard’s Stark’s honour. And all stains had to be washed out somehow...or somewhere. Even bastards could rise high there.

Abed that night sharing a room with his brothers, for Winterfell housed at least a thousand people, Jon lay awake wondering where his place was in the world. Robb would be Lord one day. He had it all: an easy way with the people, a beautiful bride, the love of two parents. His road was paved. As were the paths his sisters had to walk. Whether this prince or another, both girls would marry and live as mistresses of their own castles. The king had asked Father to be his Hand and while he was yet to accept, not many people refused a king. If Father left as Arya would one day, there would be no place in Winterfell for him: the bastard with nowhere to belong. Not even a mother to call his own. He was too old to deceive himself with dreams of travelling south with his father. If there was no place for him at the high table there certainly wouldn’t be one at court. The frustration made more tears well up in his eyes. Everyone had somewhere to belong, a future. Everyone but him. Even the ward, a prisoner; Theon Greyjoy was more accepted than he was. Were he to ever fancy marriage for himself he had a name to give his wife and children. Jon was a bastard, a Snow. No one would want to live with that curse. Sometimes Jon wished his father kept his cock in his breeches. It would save him this great deal of grief. 

When the time to break their fast came, Father ordered them to break their fast in his solar. Wylla Manderly came, of course, as a future lady of Winterfell; she was part of the family. Robb was sickening around her, a lovesick fool. Jon envied him for even that. No one would love Jon, the bastard. 

“The king has asked me to be his Hand,” Ned Stark announced in a tiresome voice. “And I have accepted.” Jon wasn’t sure the news was news to any of them. Lady Stark’s face wasn’t as exuberant as Jon might have expected. _That_ was a surprise. 

“He has also asked to join our houses. And your mother and I have accepted...Sansa will be betrothed to marry Prince Joffrey in a year’s time.” Sansa’s face shone with excitement and happiness. 

“Thank you father! Thank you!” She babbled, rising to kiss his cheek. Ned Stark smiled at his jubilant daughter. Even Arya smiled in relief at that. 

“And Arya and Bran will be travelling to King’s Landing with me.” 

“Yes!” Bran cried out. “Do you think Ser Barristan will let me squire for him?” He’d asked the question a hundred times since the king’s arrival. 

Arya only fumed silently beside him. Jon supposed the only reason she didn’t flare was because she had a little victory in escaping a betrothal to the prince. “I’m _not_ going,” she whispered silently instead. 

“Jon will stay here with Robb, Cat and Rickon-” 

Catelyn Stark leveled him with a look that should have reduced him to a heap of ashes on the spot.

“Father-” he managed to croak out, wringing his hands. “I..I would like to join the Night’s Watch.” If Uncle Benjen wouldn’t make the case for him, he’d do it himself. “There is great honour in serving the Wall and Uncle Benjen is there..Starks have manned the Wallfor thousands of years. I know I’m no Stark but-.” The more he spoke the more he believed in it himself. Catelyn Stark...smiled. For once she smiled at him. 

“Jon,” his father sighed. “Life on the Wall is hard.” 

_No harder than being a bastard,_ Jon thought. Nothing could be harder than that. 

Arya shouted, “You can’t!” 

“Yes, I can,” he bit back. He straightened up “Father,” he said more surely, “I have been thinking on it...ever since the day we found the wolves. You asked me what I wanted to do with my life. I’d like to join the Night’s Watch!” 

Eddard Stark leaned back in his seat and regarded Jon with the cold grey eyes of the Starks.

“I will think on it,” he said enigmatically, looking at the map laid out before him. 

Jon ate the rest of their food in silence. Why would no one let him choose a life for himself? 

Wylla Manderly and Robb Stark laughed with one another, feeding each other food as if they had no hands. 

Sansa babbled with her mother. Bran spoke excitedly with Father and Rickon stabbed at his food. Arya only looked at him expectantly. “You can’t leave,” she whispered. “I’ll be alone if you do.” 

“May I be excused?” he burst out, half-standing as he said so. “I would like to leave.” 

Jon ran the rest of the way between the Great Keep and the godswood. Why would father sentence him to a life under Lady Stark’s thumb? Jon kicked the Heart Tree, shouting. 

“You can’t leave,” Arya cried out. He hadn’t realised she followed him. “I’m not going anywhere whatever they say. We can stay here, you and I. It’ll be like always. They won’t like it but we won’t care as long as we have each other.” She had such hope in her eyes but Jon had had enough of people trying to keep him away from making his own decisions. First Uncle Benjen, then Father and now Arya. 

“Why do you keep following me?” 

“What?” 

“I’m not your septa, Arya!” he shouted. “I’m not going to trail around after you for all my life. If I want to go to the Wall. I will! You’ll get married to some little lordling or other and live your life. What am I to do when you do? Sit around being a nanny to Robb’s children?”

Arya looked at him as if he’d wrenched a knife into her heart and slowly twisted it. He felt foul until she said he next words. She was so unaware of how the world worked. “You...you could be Robb’s bannerman,” she replied with a quivering lip.

Jon laughed bitterly. “Aye Robb’s bannerman. See any bastard bannermen of Father recently have you? Is there a House Snow I’m unaware of?” Jon had no future here and he was a fool to let himself grow this old thinking he was the same as his siblings. They had a mother who planned for them. Jon didn’t even know if his was still alive. 

“Fine. I’ll go to court and I’ll tell Father I’ll only go if you come with me.” 

“I’m not even allowed to sit with the king what makes you think I’ll be allowed to go to court with him?”

Arya bit her lip before she broke out into a blinding smile. “You could go to Dorne! Prince Oberyn likes you as it is. He might even knight you. Daemon Sand is a bastard and he’s a knight now! You’re a good sword. Everyone knows that. Prince Oberyn will let you, if we ask him!”

Jon only laughed louder “And what? Be a burden to him? Look,” he said relenting somewhat, the wounded look in her eyes seemed to douse his anger, “You will marry and leave Winterfell one day and I will go to the Wall. It’s how the world works, little sister. I can be of some use there...perhaps,” he added with a smile, “I’ll grow up to be the greatest ranger they’ve ever had. Greater than even Uncle Benjen. They might even sing songs about me.”

“How many happy songs have you heard sang about the Night’s Watch?” 

Her dismissal of his dreams hurt. “Well,” he spat, spinning round to her, “not all of us have the luxury of pretending the rules don’t apply to us. You will still marry and live the rest of your life giving baby after baby to some lordling you could outwhack with a stick so it’s not like _you’ll_ be any better off than me, little sister. Welcome to the real world.”

Arya’s eyes widened with hurt. Jon spun away from her. He had no place in this world. As hurt as Arya might be, it was true. They were not the same. She had a future, he had to make his own and the only place he could rise high would be in the Night’s Watch. _They_ didn’t care who a man was in his past. The lowest of the low and a lord were only brothers on the Wall. No one would ever look down on him there.

He avoided people as much as he could in a crowded castle. He sat on the sill of the covered bridge, knees to his chin watching Robb go toe to toe with the crown prince. Jon was better than him but he would never be allowed to damage any trueborn princes, bastard that he was. Robb’s hair shone like copper and the prince’s like a golden crown. Manderly knights watched them alongside rough riders of the north, the kingsguard, and knights of the south. Quietly Jon heard someone’s whimpering. Stealthily, he moved in the direction of the stairs. 

“At least I didn’t cry,” she said to her wolf. “Not in front of him anyway,” she amended, wiping her tears on her sleeves. “Even Jon is tired of me, Nym.” 

Jon felt as if a red hot coal was placed in his chest, glowing and burning him from inside. 

His feet were grounded in place. 

She sniffed and buried her face in the wolf’s thick fur. “I only wanted us to stay together.” 

Ghost stalked beside him and then went down the stairs. Nymeria looked up to him, sensing him even when Arya did not. Ghost, already bigger than all the other wolves, moved closer to Arya, nipping his sister’s ear and then moving to lick Arya’s tears. Even the wolf knew what to do. Jon hurt her and made her cry and his wolf comforted her instead of him. Arya had only ever tried to cheer him up. Arya laughed at Ghost. But when she turned her head and saw Jon, she wiped off her tears, grimaced and made for a run. 

“No, Arya, wait!” he called out but she only ran away faster from him. Ghost ran with her and Nymeria. He finally found her hiding near the haystacks under the First Keep. “Arya, please,” he begged when she was about to run away from him again.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” Shame licked at him with scorching heat. Arya was not to blame for Lady Stark’s bruising words or for the fact he had no place in Winterfell. She was the only person who _made_ a place for him. No one said anything when he said he’d go to the Wall. No one but Arya and Father and Uncle Ben. _Perhaps they care,_ he thought. _Perhaps they’re the only ones._

“I’d never get tired of you,” he told her. It was true. Arya had been like a sun in his life ever since she came wailing into the world before he was even three. He couldn’t remember a life without her. She raised her eyes to look up at him for the first time then. “And I’d love to be here with you for the rest of my life.” That was true too. If they could stay home, none of them growing up, perhaps they could preserve what they had but life would not wait for them. A king had entered their life and with him the game of thrones. “But I can’t.” His voice broke at that. It was his first outright admission that he had no place in Winterfell. Arya said no words. She only looked blankly at him, but not unseeing. He could see her grey eyes studying him. Her reddened grey eyes. Reddened because of him. “Robb is marrying in a week,” he continued, “he will have sons who will follow him and daughters one day. Bran will have a holdfast of his own. You will marry. Don’t give me that face. You will, little sister. Even you will one day find a lordling you can stand. But I will have none of that. I am a Snow, sister. Not a Stark.”

“But-“

“It’s not fair. I know.” Jon had known that since he was a child. “But it is the way of the world. If I could be by your side forever I would. But I will come and visit you, I promise. Just like Uncle Benjen.”

“When was the last time Uncle Benjen came and visited?”

“Alright,” he admitted. “I’ll try to come more often than Uncle Benjen. You waiting me for me would make me come more often.” That elicited a smile from her. It was true. Jon would move mountains for her. 

Her smile faded though. “You could have told me that before,” she mumbled. 

Jon looked at her confused. 

“I agreed to go south with father,” she said, sadly. “If you leave, Robb will be so busy when father leaves. He’ll be the Stark in Winterfell, he won’t see me. I’ll be alone without you and Bran. Since you will leave me. I decided to go south with Bran.” 

Jon pulled her into his arms. “It’s alright,” he said. She’d marry one day and he’d have to get used to not seeing her so often. “We can still see each other when you return.” _As rare as that might be._ King’s Landing was a proper city and she would definitely find people more exciting than him. _Perhaps even some knight or lord._

At his suggestion, they went for a walk over the hills on the castle grounds, away from everyone. Just the two of them. Just like always. Arya told him more about the bumbling king. “I don’t like the queen either,” she confessed. “Every one of her smiles is false.” On and on they walked, laughing with each other. At one point Nymeria decided she would walk no further. Arya laughed, sweeping her into her arms and kissing the wolf’s furry head. The wolf only yawned in return, red tongue popping out. Right there, she fell asleep. “I’ll take her,” Jon volunteered. 

Arya only laughed and called him too weak to carry her. “She’s getting bigger every day.” 

Jon shrugged and lifted Nymeria with one arm and extended the other to draw Arya close enough to him so he could kiss her head. 

Their return to the courtyard of the Inner Castle was greeted with the arrival of Lord and Lady Hornwood and their party. The brown bullmoose with black antlers on orange flapped proudly in the north wind. Lord Hornwood’s face was grave. 

“Jon,” he grunted. “I must see your father.” The word was a command not a request. In their company were two dirty, cowering girls. 

Arya shot him an uncertain look. She took Nymeria from him before immediately lowering the heavy pup. 

“Please, come with me,” Arya said to them. “We’ll have some refreshments readied for you.”

“There’s no need,” Lord Hornwood interjected. “We will _all_ be speaking before Lord Stark.”

Jon walked them to his father’s solar. Fortunately for him Father _was_ there. He sat with Uncle Benjen, poring over a map. 

Jon cleared his throat to alert them of his presence. “Lord Stark, Lord and Lady Hornwood are here to see you.”

“Shouldn’t you guide them to Vayon?” his uncle laughed. “Or do you take each guest to their rooms _Lord Stark.”_

His father only smiled. “What is it Jon?”

“I don’t know, Father. They just arrived and demanded to see you. They have these two girls with them. Servants by the look of it. They said the girls would speak to you.”

“Let them in,” his father ordered. Uncle Benjen kept his seat. “And you stay as well.”

Jon couldn’t help but grin. Robb usually sat with their father when he held audiences or met with his lords. If Jon ever joined him it was because Robb was there first.

“Roose Bolton travelled south to the Rills for Lord Ryswell’s third wedding a moon turn ago,” Lord Hornwood began. “And his bastard has been terrorising his lands in his absence. Since our lands neighbour his, terrifying tales have reached us, my lord.”

“I must confess, I do not know him,” Father replied, warily looking at the shivering girls. 

“Few do.” Lady Hornwood spoke for the first time. “He lived with his mother until two years past, when young Domeric died and left Bolton without an heir. That was when he brought his bastard to the Dreadfort. The boy is a sly creature by all accounts, and he has a servant who is almost as cruel as he is. Reek, they call the man. It’s said he never bathes. They hunt together, the Bastard and this Reek, and not for deer. We heard tales, things we could scarce believe, even of a Bolton but in the last fortnight both Aly and Kyra,” she gestured at the girls, “turned up on our lands, naked and fleeing the Bolton bastard and his hounds. Since Lord Bolton is not there to reign him in, we thought it best to raise this matter with you, my lord.”

Some lords were yet to arrive for the wedding. The Ryswells, the Dustins and the Glovers chief amongst them. Pale eyed Roose Bolton was also yet to arrive. Hunting down criminals normally fell to the lord of each land. Jon didn’t believe for a moment that this would come to Father before it reached Lord Bolton.

“He...he stripped me n-naked, milord,” the red head stuttered. “And then he dragged me and another to the woods. Then..” she hiccuped through her tears. “Then he released his dogs.” Sobs broke through her and she could speak no more. 

The other one shared a similar story.

“Why has no one told Lord Bolton of this?”

“My lo-“ the redhead said before the other one silenced her. “My lord Bolton doesn’t know,” she offered in her place. “The bastard says they fell ill. Everyone else is scared of him. He only plays his sport when the lord is gone.” 

“Were you two the first?”

“No milord. He names his dogs after the other girls he killed. He has a whole pack of them. He told me he’d be merciful. He’d give me a quick death if I was a good.”

“He said he’d flay me milord and wear my skin for a cloak.”

Jon used to think that was just one of Old Nan’s stories. Flaying had been banned in the North for centuries.

“He’s as blackhearted as only a bastard could be,” spat Lady Hornwood. She spat the word bastard in much the same way Lady Stark often did. She did so with the same disregard for him in the room as well. The bastard of Winterfell, it seemed hardly stood for a person where some were concerned. He was merely part of the furniture. 

“And someone must reign him in, my lord. We come to you, seeking justice for these poor girls and those who’ve come before them.”

Father said he could not go himself but he would send fifty men to root out the bastard. He would be tried and sentenced at Winterfell. Father promised to do it himself. When the Hornwoods left, Jon begged father to let him lead the men. 

“Father, please.”

“You’ll miss the wedding,” he said. “Your brother will want you there.”

“That’s not until a week! I’ll take the fastest horse and Ghost. I’ll be there in two days, three at most. I’ll bring him back here in time for the wedding. I know I can. I have to show them all that not all bastards are black-hearted. Please, Father. I can be good for something.”

His father studied him for a long time. “You don’t have to prove yourself to anyone. My blood flows through your veins. You are not black of blood but... if you would insist on doing this. You have my leave. Ask Jory to give you the men.”

Jon sat proud on his courser as he led guards out of Winterfell’s walls. He turned back to see his father look down at him with something akin to pride. 

_“All dwarfs may be bastards,’_ the Imp said, ‘ _yet not all bastards need be dwarfs.’_ Jon would show them all the same. _Let them say Ned Stark had four boys instead of three._ Snow...Stark... let them call him just. Let them call him brave. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you didn’t have high hopes of Robert’s “fatherhood.” He had two good kids in Tommen and Myrcella and still didn’t get it right with them. 
> 
> Jon, here, is having an existential crisis, trying to figure out what he wants from life and where he might find belonging. That might explain some of his moodiness. 
> 
> Winterfell’s builders did not level the ground so the castle grounds contain hills. 
> 
> I love Maester Luwin as much as the next person but he was a bit of a meddler in terms of deciding Jon’s future. If Ben was serious about Jon joining him he could have spoken directly to his own brother. Why would he send the maester, unless it was to ask him to talk Jon out of going to the wall or just mentioning it in passing. I decided to give Jon the agency to ask for it here himself.
> 
> I’ve written and re-written my outline around 5 times since the last chapter lol, hence the delay in getting this one out. I’m now confident my current envisioned outcome is the final product.
> 
> For the story to move forward I’ll need to go back at some point and change the references to Quentyn & Trystane being betrothed - I’ve decided I’ve got other plans for them - Trystane especially. 
> 
> Unfortunately, the Jon/Arya will still be toward the end of this story. In previous drafts they reunited earlier but it took longer to get them to the place where they weren’t just brother/sister. This time it’ll take them longer to reunite but once they do things heat up quite quickly because... pressure makes diamonds lol. I also think this new outline works well in having people put some respect on Arya’s name. She won’t be a damsel in distress which is what she appeared to be in previous versions. Nor will most characters tbh. There’s more doing and less talking. 
> 
> We started this story with Elia and we’ll continue on with her. She’ll probably be the POV with the most chapters. But that should be no surprise. The story is called Winter Suns after all lol. 
> 
> Ned was our other major POV but I’ve decided to torture the hell out of the Starks because why not?


	20. Elia

**Elia**

It was a relief to finally make out the grey walls of Winterfell in the distance. For the last few days they had traversed rolling hills, seemingly never-ending forests with glades bordered by small farms and meadows where ewes grazed with their lambs. And much as this was beautiful country, Elia wanted little more than a warm bath and a bed where she would be engulfed in the warmth of her husband...a room to themselves - a rarity since they set off from Deepwood Motte and possibly a rarity still if the whole of the north had already descended on the castle as she expected. Inns had popped up in the wolfswood courtesy of increased trade but they had to share their rooms with their party. Still, lucky for them that spring was here, they might get a few rooms in winter town. 

Their party had grown over the course of their travel. They were joined by the Boles, Branches, Forresters and the Woods of the Wolfswood along the way. Elia had been in the north for so long that these had become her people. She had set off with Ethan, his brothers, and their ward Larence Snow. Elia had never been able to give Ethan a son of his own. Halys Hornwood’s witty bastard and their nephew and niece, Gawen and Erena had been the closest things they had to children. Ethan had never complained along the way. Her man, her great man had been the rock she built her life upon after the nightmare of the wars. He was the mountain she leaned against. And every night, as she lay next to him, her comfort with him battled guilt. _Soon,_ she’d tell herself every night. Soon she’d tell her husband everything. She just hoped he wouldn’t hate her. She hoped, after everything he’d seen himself, he’d understand her. She was sure he would. The opposite was too horrid to imagine. 

Behind them carts trundled along - grain to replenish part of Winterfell’s stores. Every house would bring some provisions with them to alleviate the strain of hosting a celebration of this size. Such was the northern way. For a people who had so little, they were open handed. _Share in adversity,_ was an unstated rule. They also brought with them gifts for the happy couple. For a moment Elia’s thoughts went to her son. Arianne had gone to Norvos to meet him. Elia wondered how they were getting on and whether she would ever see her son wed as Ned Stark would his own. Their babies born amidst conflict. 

“Princess, look!” said Larence, pointing at the numerous banners adorning Winterfell’s walls. “I can see my father’s sigil!” Elia spotted the burnt-orange of House Hornwood. Larence galloped off in the direction of the castle, no doubt eager to reunite with his father. A motley of banners adorned Winterfell’s walls. Every house that came lay their sigil on the walls. _We are here,_ they all seemed to say. The north had come to witness the wedding of their future lord. It had been so long since they had. War and tragedy struck House Stark’s previous generation. Ned had to wed in the middle of a war so far from home. Not so this time. It was spring now, a time to sow the seeds of a prosperous future. They were still too far to make out each of the banners clearly. But even from this distance, Elia could see four banners stand tall higher than all the rest: the white of Stark, the green-blue of Manderly, and two banners she couldn’t make out. One yellow, the other red. The yellow banner was not the yellow of the ten green frogs of House Marsh or the six green thristles on yellow of the Norreys nor did it belong to the Dustins...and the red, she realised as they got closer to the castle, was no red at all. It was crimson. _A golden lion on a crimson field._

Elia felt a wave of ice-cold fear wash through her. The yellow banner boasted the pranced stag of Baratheon. She had not seen either banner since…Her heart leapt erratically in her chest. She heard Eddard Stark’s voice bounce off the walls of the throne room. “ _They killed the children!_ ” Despite the ringing in her ears she heard the _reply. “Dragonspawn…She would look for someone to blame. Perhaps she killed them herself in fear for them.”_ Elia raised a hand to her throat. She saw cold green eyes with flecks of gold gloating at the sight of her dead children. “ _I caught your man attempting to rape the princess!”_ She was choking. _“Those were not my orders. I ordered my men to secure the children. Their orders were to present the children to our new king.”_ She realised she was crying. _I can’t breathe._ “Ethan,” she croaked, “Ethan I can’t breathe!” Her limbs felt numb, a tingling feeling ran up and down them. She couldn’t hold the reins of her horse properly. 

“Ethan, I can’t. Ethan.” Her plea came out in a strained whisper. She felt strong arms come around her. The world was spinning. “Ethan, I-“ Her world went black. 

She jerked up, spluttering everywhere, coughing and reeling from the rancid smell of what could only be smelling salts. Her heart beat loudly in her ears and her eyes saw the old leathered face of Winterfell’s maester.

“Hello, Princess.”

“Maester Luwin.”

Ethan smiled, no doubt sending a prayer. “I’ve got you, love,” he said, kissing her. 

“Where am I?”

The maester tugged the chain around his neck and looked to her husband for a command. 

It was a clean enough place, lit by a number of torches, with a small hearth, strong walls and an equally stout door...but it was no room in Winterfell. She knew that much. 

“Thank you, Maester Luwin,” her husband said in dismissal of the maester. He waited until the door shut. “We’re in the Smoking Log love.” He took a hold of her hand. “We can return home now. We don’t have to go inside. Ned’ll understand. Galbart and Robett will attend the wedding on behalf of House Glover.” 

Elia let go of his hand only to thread her fingers through his. “You’d turn back from a king...from your liege's invitation for me?”

Eyes the colour of rich earth met hers. He brushed her hair back and planted a soft kiss on her cheek. “I’d turn my back on everyone if I had to.”

A warmth gushed through her heart and for a moment she nearly spilled the truth about her son. But Lannisters were here and one wrong word may endanger her only child. They’d already made an attempt on him.“I might hold you to that one day, my lord.”

“Let it never be said a Glover broke a vow.” He smiled at her, stroking her hair. “Say the word, Eli. We’ll leave.”

She kissed him. “I love you.”

“And I, you, princess.” 

Elia moved into his lap. He was big, and she tiny compared to him. He was her cocoon of safety. 

“I’m guessing the stag and the lion belong to Robert and his wife.”

“Aye...the king is here to ask Ned to become his Hand.”

Elia’s innards coiled themselves in tight knots. She had heard Jon Arryn had died. A raven had come from King’s Landing to each major house in the realm. But she knew nothing more of what befell him. Oberyn was yet to arrive and some things were too risky to send by way of raven. 

“And he accepted?” she asked, fearful of the answer she’d already guessed. 

Her husband only nodded. “Sansa has also been betrothed to Prince Joffrey.”

A feeling of betrayal crashed against her like the blow of a hammer through her chest. _How could he give his daughter to such a man’s son? The man who laughed at the bodies of children? My Rhaenys._ Closer ties between Robert and Ned Stark would crush any hopes of her son returning to his throne with as little bloodshed as possible. Ned Stark, with Jon Arryn gone, was kingmaker in much the same way Tywin Lannister was. Especially now. Especially as Hand. 

“Elia.” Her husband held her face between his hands. “You never have to see any of them again. We’ll go home.” She smiled at him. Ethan had held her when she woke screaming at night and she had done the same for him when his own horrors paid him a visit. 

“No.” She raised a hand to rest against his on her cheek. _I am Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken._ “The North is _my_ home. They are the guests here. Let them cower from me. My conscience is clean.” He rewarded her with a kiss. 

“Is Oberyn here yet?” He was the only person who could help her make sense of what was happening. 

“No, my love.”

“Lie with me,” she said. “We’ll go to the castle in the morning.”

-

When morning came, Elia steeled herself. That was not to say she was not a bundle of nerves. Time in King Scab’s court taught her how to hide her fears with a veneer of calm - a last gift from Rhaegar who perfected the look of a man dead behind the eyes. 

Winterfell and its surrounding town were alive with industry. Mikken’s forge was already up and going, servant women darted back and forty with heavy baskets of fresh or soiled linen or foodstuffs, others rushed around, carrying and fetching all manner of things. 

“Ethan! Elia haha!” Martyn Cassel captured both of them in a hug, crushing Elia between her own burly husband and himself. Elia could never replace her own Uncle Lewyn but old Martyn had become family of sorts to her. Elia reflected there, stuck between the two men and their smell of old leather that even the worst event of her life had granted her a life-long friendship with the most unlikely off people for the moment Martyn let go of her, Theo Wull picked her up and spun her around as if she was a rag doll.

“Ah, Princess but it is so good to see you!” Elia couldn’t help but laugh. All these years later and she now understood Buckets’ accent as if it were her own. It had not always been so. After him came Willam Dustin who’d travelled with their party as far as Storm’s End. Strong arms seemed to envelope her at his arrival as well. Jory Cassel came next with his own father - other friends from her first travels with the northmen as well. These she hadn’t been so familiar with in those early days but years in the north had made them beloved to her. 

“My lord, let’s get you settled then, come with me,” said Jory before he paused abruptly. “Where are your belongings?”

“At the Smoking Log. Winterfell’s is crowded,” her husband explained, “we’re staying at the inn.” It was his idea to settle close enough to the castle so as to not offend their hosts but far enough to give her a place of respite far from Robert’s court should she need it. He stayed a protective shadow hovering over her all morning. They gifted the new couple, caught up with their own family, and shared mead with Lord Manderly. 

“I hope the prince will be gracing us with his presence,” the Lord of New Castle said. “It has been so long since I’ve seen him.”

“He should be, my lord. Although _quite_ what has kept him I do not know.” Elia speared a slice of venison. Her brother should have arrived a while ago. He always came at the same time every year and she needed him more than ever now. What had happened at Robert’s court to have him hightailing it all the way here, somewhere no recent court in history had traveled? 

The conversation sped on around her but Elia could find no allure to it, such was the noise in her head. Something was happening and Elia had no way of knowing. She was yet to see Robert or anyone she recognised from his court. Apparently he’d gone for a ride in the Wolfswood. Dread lurched in her gut. _Was Jon with him?_ Rhaegar’s boy. She turned her eyes to Robb Stark, a gallant youth if ever there was one. Honest and honourable and so much like his father even if he looked nothing like him. 

“Where’s Jon?” she found herself ask. 

“Father’s charged him to find Roose Bolton’s bastard.”

“For what reason?” Elia hadn’t known Roose Bolton _had_ a bastard. 

“The bastard’s been stripping girls and hunting them in the woods with his dogs.” Wylla Manderly made a face of disgust. “The girls say he’s been flaying them and keeping their skins.”

She listened in horror as they recounted the story of the two girls who’d turned up on the Hornwood lands naked and bloody. The bastard of Bolton was a terror.

“Will Jon be alright?” Ethan squeezed her thigh under the table. “Those dogs sound a horror.”

Robb smiled. “He‘s taken Ghost and I sent Greywind along with him to make quick work of them so he can get back in time.”

Elia looked at him in confusion. “Who?”

“Oh,” he grinned, “we found direwolf pups. They’re already bigger than any dog from the kennels. Farlen’s gone with him too. I named mine Grey Wind because he runs so fast and Jon’s is Ghost because he’s white...and quiet.” 

“Direwolves?” Elia imagined the Stark sigil bore only a creature from Old Nan’s stories. 

“Come,” he said, downing his drink and taking her hand, “I’ll show you.” Even at six-and-ten and about to be married, he reminded her so much of the little boy who’d lead her around the castle, keen to show her things he’d done or found. He took her to the First Keep, where Bran played with his wolf amidst haystacks. 

The pups _were_ bigger than any dog she’d ever seen. They were almost of a size with the wolves she’d seen in the Wolfswood. 

“You can touch him,” Bran proffered proudly of his wolf. “I’ve still not found a name for him. Even Rickon’s got a name for his.”

“And what’s that?”

“Shaggydog...He’s five.”

Elia laughed, extending her hand to the wolf’s head. “Aren’t you scared to have wolves for pets? They are made for the wild after all.” 

“No. They only hurt people we _want_ them to hurt.” They had identical grins on their faces that made Elia chuckle more. The wolf in question had settled its head in her lap. 

“You must be proud to have a king at your wedding, Robb,” she said. 

He blushed and looked down. Both boys shared a queer look between them. “It is an honour, Princess,” he faltered. 

“He’s...not what I expected,” Bran said more honestly. “And his Kingsguard look nothing like the stories.”

“Have all of them come with him?” Her heart travelled up and down her throat. _Jaime?_ she wanted to ask.

“No, Princess. Just Ser Boros and Ser Meryn-“ Elia knew neither. “And...Bran looked at his brother. Ser Jaime too. He _looks_ like the knights in the songs but Robb says he shouldn’t count.” Despite the wild beat in her chest, she couldn’t help but smile at Ned Stark’s oldest boy. He hadn’t changed his opinion in ten years. He said at six that Jaime shouldn’t have counted for his killing of Aerys. She had not seen him since the day he killed Aerys…and chose to sit upon a throne rather than do his duty to see to her children’s safety. She had not quite forgiven that fault of his. What she saw later of the Kingsguard Robert _did_ have pleased her. None of his men-at-arms throughout the castle impressed her. Even the two Kingsguard she saw sparring in the yard were pitiful. _Arthur would make quick work of them_ , she thought, _without breaking a sweat._ Ser Boros was a bald man with a jowly face, and Ser Meryn had droopy eyes and a beard the color of rust. And the way he hacked with his sword was all wrong. 

“But,” Bran added more excitedly, “Father promised I could meet Ser Barristan when we get to King’s Landing.” He sat straighter. “I’ve been marking the days on my wall. I’ll be knight when I’m older Princess Elia.”

“You’ll be the greatest of them all, my dear,” she assured him, tapping his nose. “I didn’t know _you_ were going to King’s Landing too.”

“I’m going with Sansa and Arya. Sansa’s marrying the prince and Arya is…”

“Mother thinks I’ll have no choice but to learn how to be a lady,” the girl in question finished for him. At her side was a wolf of her own. Warm amber eyes regarded Elia. 

“Arya,” she said, moving toward her, still wary of the wolf. She embraced her tightly. Elia knew she shouldn’t have favourites but something about the girl drew her in even when she was a child. She had a wild spirit that would thrive in Dorne. It was why she suggested the match with Trystane. It rankled that Ned had refused Trystane as a partner for one daughter only to betroth the other to Robert Baratheon’s son. 

If Elia was going to find out anything about Robert before she saw the oaf, she knew this girl would be the one to tell it all.

“What’s _your_ wolf’s name?”

“Nymeria,” she grinned. 

“Of course.” Elia laughed. _Of course_. She always used to ask for stories about Nymeria of Ny Sar as a child. 

“I best get back,” Robb said moving away. She sat back down on the hay with the younger Starks. 

“Do you not want to go?” she asked Arya. 

“Bran’s leaving and so is Jon. If I can’t join Jon, I’ll go with Bran.”

“Where’s Jon going?”

“He wants to join the Night’s Watch,” Bran answered. “It’s almost as good as the Kingsguard.”

Elia clenched her jaw. She knew whose idea this was, even _if_ the boy asked for it. “What does your father say?” 

“He said he’ll think on it.”

Ned Stark made a promise to his sister to protect her child. Elia told herself he would not forsake him to freeze for the rest of his life without ever knowing a woman’s love or the feel of a child in his arms. She would not let it be so anyway. The boy was a prince of the blood and soon Egg’s time would come. Elia knew it even if she did not know how. 

“Perhaps you’ll find you enjoy your time in court,” Elia said instead. 

Arya only scoffed. 

“What’s wrong?”

“The king is a drunk, the queen scowls all day long and Joffrey...Jon says he’s a little shit. He had a fight with Robb even though he couldn’t beat him in practice _and_ none of our wolves like him except Sansa’s.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“He thinks he’s too good for Winterfell,” said Bran. “Mother wants me to be friends with him to ease the rift with Robb but he doesn’t even notice me. I like Tommen though.”

“And Sansa?”

“Sansa is stupid.” Arya scowled. The two girls had seldom got on since they were children. “She thinks being a prince makes him a good person but a maggot dipped in honey is still a maggot.”

Elia couldn’t help but laugh. 

“And what does your father say?”

“Father is sad,” Bran said. 

“It’s because the king keeps talking of Aunt Lyanna. He keeps talking about how much I look like her.”

The girl had more in common with Lyanna than just her looks and the picture the children painted had so much in common with what her own brothers had told her. Robert’s court was filled with unremarkable people or those who actively schemed against him. That Robert held little love for his wife was well known. He abided her wants for he was half a kingdom in debt to her father. That he still managed to seek out Ned rather than her father told Elia that Robert did not _trust_ the Lannisters. That he would turn to a man who famously held Tywin Lannister responsible for the deaths of Elia’s children was quite the statement to make - even if inadvertent. Ned Stark could not be bought. In court, those who could not be bought were disposed of and Tywin Lannister dealt dismissal with death. Elia knew as well as she knew her name that a conflict would come, and soon. In a way, she was grateful he’d chosen Ned and not his brother Stannis. He was the only truly capable man in Robert’s council now and had too much to gain from keeping the Baratheons in power. That Robert didn’t choose him was curious. Stannis Baratheon _was_ on his council. She found it too queer a matter to learn Stannis was not in Robert’s party. Ned accepting the position also surprised her. He had never had a taste for the game. For the thousandth time that day she wished Oberyn were here. Varys always sent him with news, and she had never needed to know more, more than now. 

Elia left the the children to find her husband when a blast of trumpets announced the arrival of the royal party. Ned Stark sported dark hollows under his eyes and even from where he sat his horse Elia could see the tension flowing through him like a current through a fast river - invisible to those who did not know him as well as Elia did. The two of them had lived through the most horrifying events in their lives together. She saw the clenched jaw, the twitching of his left eye and the white-knuckled hold he had on his reins. It was the man next to him who she did not recognise. Almost as round as he was tall, _Robert Baratheon._ He looked...swollen. The years had not been kind to him at all. He was...misshapen. 

And behind him sat Jaime Lannister. The years had been kind to _him._ Gone was the unsure boy Ser Gerold bestowed a white cloak on. In his place stood a tall and handsome man, with golden curls. _He does look like a knight from the songs._

People bent the knee at Robert’s arrival. Elia could not bring herself to revere the man who laughed at the deaths of her children. She dipped her head in a minimal bow in his direction, seething all the while. 

“Ah Elia Martell,” he bellowed in his abrasive voice as he flopped off his horse. “It has been a long time.”

“It has, Your Grace. I almost didn’t recognise you.”

He glowered at her understanding what she meant. “You and your brothers haven’t visited court.”

“I can not speak for my brothers, Your Grace but I have built myself a good life here. The North still values honour and justice, a rarity in the world these days.”

The yard was as silent as the grave - no, not exactly. Elia could hear the sound of the wild beating of her heart. She bit her cheeks determined not to cry. He was the guilty party not her. Elia raised her eyes and held his. “But you _are_ right Your Grace,” she smiled. “It _has_ been too long. I think it’s finally time I visited King’s Landing. My children’s ashes _are_ interred at the Sept of Baelor after all.”

From the corner of her eye she saw Ned Stark tug at his collar and Jaime Lannister bristle where he stood but Elia had eyes only for the man who built his kingdom on the bones of dead children. 

“Where is this husband of yours then?” He asked, giving up the war of wills and looking away from her.

“Doing something useful I’m sure...I am yet to see the queen. It has been longer still since I’ve seen her.”

“She’s doing something useful, I’m sure.” He smirked with an ugly mouth. 

Everyone still watched them. Elia moved closer to him. “You have my congratulations, Your Grace. I hear you are about to become a good father.”

She watched his plump wet mouth twitch into a smile. 

“I hope Sansa is as happy with Prince Joffrey as Lyanna was with you.” Ned Stark gulped loud enough for her to hear. “Now,” she smiled a smile as sweet as only hatred could be. “If you would excuse me, Your Grace, I was making my way to the sept. I will pray Sansa and Joffrey’s story has a happier end than yours I will also remember you in my prayers.” That seemed to surprise him. “May you continue to enjoy the bounties of kingship.” _And may they kill you._

Elia walked away, her back straight, eyes straight ahead and chin raised. 

Jaime Lannister found her later in the sept, bowing at the statue of the Mother. He lit a candle beside the Warrior and hovered around the place, trying, she understood, to summon the courage to approach her. 

“Princess,” he said finally, kneeling beside her. 

“Ser Jaime.” His green eyes were heavy with guilt. “What do you want?”

“Princess,” he trailed off. “I...didn’t get a chance to...give you my condolences.”

Elia turned to him, fire raging in her heart. “Rhaegar trusted you. I trusted you and when I needed you most you were not there to save me from the men your father sent.” Elia inhaled loudly, willing her tears away. 

“Princess, I swear it. I did not think the children would be hurt. You were in the holdfast. I...thought it would be safe…” She saw a tear fall down his eye. “I tried to do the right thing. I asked the king to give me leave to negotiate terms with my father. He refused to hear it of me.” Jaime looked at the statue of the Father. “I tried to do what was right.”

“And what was that?”

“To save King’s Landing. King Aerys, he...was going to burn the city… there were wildfire caches everywhere, he wanted to leave Robert only ashes.”

That did not surprise her. Aerys had succumbed to madness, and found arousal in burning people. To hear he planned to burn an entire city was not farfetched at all. “I do not blame you for killing your king,” she told him. He turned his head suddenly to look at her. It was clear not many people said that to him. “And I believe every derision levelled at you for kingslaying is misplaced. If what you say is true, then you saved thousands of lives.” Jamie’s eyes widened. “Aerys Targaryen was a horrid man who needed to be put down. Even Rhaegar may have forgiven you that. What I do not forgive you for, Ser, is for sitting on that throne waiting for your father when your duty was to me and my children. You failed Rhaegar, who entrusted you with us, you failed me. Your father’s man would have had his way with me if my own husband’s enemy did not arrive in time. And you failed my children. Your prince and princess. My Rhaenys thought you her protector. For _that_ I will never forgive you. You will have to seek absolution for that elsewhere.”

Elia left a broken knight at the altar of the Mother. She did not have it in her to forgive his wrongs. Perhaps his gods might.

Elia was trying to find her husband when a page, aged six at most, came to find her. He was clearly northern by his looks and of Winterfell, even if she didn’t know him. He knew his way around the castle, Ned Stark had summoned her. 

“Ah, Princess Elia. I heard you were here.” 

Elia restrained the urge to roll her eyes and dipped minimally. Again. The butt of her and Rhaegar’s jokes had become queen. 

“Funny thing fortune,” Cersei Lannister remarked. “If someone would have told us when we were ladies at court that we would meet in Winterfell one day in this way. How hard would we have laughed.”

The woman always had all the subtlety of a fool with bells. “Fortune is fickle,” she agreed.

“You have my condolences for what happened to your beautiful children.” The woman took a hold of her own daughter’s shoulders. “The game of thrones cares not for the innocent.”

Elia took a lock of the girl’s golden curls in hand. “The Princess is beautiful.” The young girl gleamed. “May you always be able to protect her. The game of thrones never stops and is, I’ve learnt to my own sorrow, a most inconstant source of security.” 

Cersei stepped away, pulling her daughter with her. “I was so saddened to hear that you were left here to freeze amongst the ice. So much misfortune for one so good.” Her smile was corrosive, still she pushed her daughter behind her and moved to take Elia’s hand in hers. “Is there anything I can do for you? Our mothers were friends once.”

“I thank you for your benevolence but I am happy here, amongst the ice. I have warmth enough in my husband and my family. I was quite fortunate in my match. I hear you too have been fortunate. The tales I hear speak of a king and queen who are the paragon of wedded bliss. I am _so_ happy for you.” Elia returned Cersei’s now curdling smile, she was always so easy to ruffle.  
“Well,” she imparted airily in turn, “Robert _is_ quite the romantic. He named me his queen of love and beauty upon his victory at the Trident, and every tourney since he has done so. Just as Rhaegar did Lyanna.”

“I am happy to hear of your happiness. Long may it continue. Now if you would excuse me, Lord Stark awaits.”

“Of course. I wouldn’t want to keep you. We should have tea sometime. It would appear the north’s gruff manner has rubbed off on you. You haven’t addressed me with the correct title. Your Grace.”

“Of course,” Elia smiled, walking away. 

“There,” the page said when they got to the Stark solar, “Lord Stark awaits you.” With that, his task it seemed was achieved for he ran to sit on a bench further down the corridor. 

Ned Stark cut a lonely figure at his desk. He was so engrossed by the map in front of him. The moment he saw her he shot to his feet. “Princess.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was hoping for a longer chapter but life is busy atm. I wanted to get something out though more of the juicy stuff is later. 
> 
> I haven’t proofread this chapter - so tired am I. I’ll correct on re-read (hopefully).
> 
> Ps: where the hell is Oberyn?


	21. Eddard

**Eddard**

Robert Baratheon had always been a man of great appetites. He loved freely...wantonly even, but he had his graces too. He made friends of enemies and inspired loyalty in men with his generosity. They were once two boys raised in an unfamiliar land as different as night and day. They formed, against all odds, a brotherhood that brought about the end of a dynasty under the guidance of the most honourable of men. The bloated man who rode into Winterfell, bringing with him the harshest of storms, was a veritable stranger to Ned Stark. Gone was the Robert who swung, with little effort, a warhammer Ned could scarcely lift. In his place stood a man too fat for the armour that earned him the name the Demon of the Trident. It had been sixteen years since the rebellion, a time in which they both created families for themselves; a time during which hot blood mellowed to allow them both to create quiet, settled lives with their families. Ned had found some solace and serenity. Robert had not. Every one of his vices worsened until he became a shell of himself and, dare Ned say it, an embarrassment to the man who raised them both. The king whored openly, drunk without measure and disrespected his wife for all to see. As he did so at the welcoming feast and every moment since, Lyanna’s words echoed in his head. “ _Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature._ ” 

Robert, it appeared, had rewritten every interaction he had with Lyanna, proclaiming her the love of his life in full hearing of his wife. None of that warmth was shown to her while alive beyond words. _Words are wind._

Robert’s interaction with Elia in the courtyard made Ned’s innards tighten with shame as he recalled the look on her face. The inner resolve he had so carefully nurtured blew away like a leaf in the wind. They had failed her children, Robert laughed at them and Elia was left to build a life for herself from the wreckage - she was the greatest victim of Robert’s Rebellion. That he did not have the wherewithal to even recognise that all these years later disappointed Ned the most. 

Were Robert to travel north merely to seek a Hand, Ned would have declined him. The little he saw disappointed him and propping the stranger king up was no task for him. He had duties here, in the north. With his family as his father would have wanted. A Stark’s place is in Winterfell, he told his wife when he broached the subject of refusing the king. Not that such words pleased his wife of course. For Catelyn the king’s request was an honour, he’d travelled a thousand leagues to make it in person. That he would bring with it a marriage proposal of Catelyn’s dreams only sweetened the deal for his wife. Their daughter would be queen. Sansa of course was infatuated with the idea. Yet the match filled him with a heavy and inexplicable dread. In the crypts, where the king made his request, Ned felt the eyes of his dead ancestors watching him with cold disapproval. And his foreboding only increased since. 

But the real knot in his gut was tied when the letter arrived, in the dead of the night in a language known only to Cat and her sister. “Lysa says Jon Arryn was murdered. The Lannisters..The queen. Now we truly have no choice. You must be Robert’s Hand. You must go south with him and learn the truth.”

Ned had told his wife the abiding truth in his life since the year he lost his family and the woman he loved. “ _The only truths I know are here. The south is a nest of adders I would do better to avoid._ ” The south had only brought him grief and taken everything he loved. Brandon, Father, Lyanna...even Benjen. With it, it took Ashara, who he should have told the truth to. Not that it would have made a difference. He was married anyway...but she would have been alive and that would have been enough. 

Grudgingly though Ned owed a duty to the man he loved, the man who raised him as a son and taught him so much of what he knew of the world - the man who waged a war for his head. Jon Arryn was the only man who had the courage to say no to tyranny. There must have been some truth to Lysa Arryn’s words even if her conclusion might be wrong. Robert’s words in the crypts seemed to suggest so anyway. “I have never seen a man sicken so quickly,” Robert said in lamentation. “We gave a tourney on my son’s name day. If you had seen Jon then, you would have sworn he would live forever. A fortnight later he was dead. The sickness was like a fire in his gut. It burned right through him.”

Ned had little cause to trust a Lannister. One killed his king and the other ordered the death of children. That a third might kill the Hand of the King was not out of the bounds of Ned’s imagination, even if the accusation was a surprise. Why had Jon Arryn, been killed, if at all? Ned told himself he would find out the truth of the matter, expose it and return home. His place was here and he asked for a year-long betrothal to get to know the boy. Ned would not make the same mistake he made with Lyanna again. Nor would he leave his daughter in a nest of murderous adders. Sansa had always been the most trusting of his children. 

Before he left however, he had matters to set right. Ned rolled open his map once more. The wedding was to take place the day after tomorrow and Jon was yet to return.His thoughts turned to him often. His lonely boy; the child he realised almost too late that he had failed. The child he failed to give a sense of home. He would not fail him again. 

Ned sat there waiting for Elia to arrive, he had already met and got Ethan’s approval separately - Brandon’s brother even now. 

Elia’s love for the boy always astounded him. There was Cat, his wife who somehow could not find it in her heart to love a motherless child born from the loins of a man who, at the time, she did not know or love. It was the greatest flaw in an otherwise good woman, Ned often thought. And then there was Elia. A woman who had every reason to hate Lyanna and her child for all that befell her. And yet over the years she remained the child’s greatest champion. More than once she told Ned “I cannot be with my Aegon, so I do for him what I wish someone did for my boy.” Ned would hold her to her word now. _For a few months only,_ he told himself. Then he would return home to give Lyanna’s boy, his boy, a place of honour in his home. It was time to put his mistreatment to an end. After all, Winterfell was Lyanna’s place more than it was ever his. Ned and his brothers had been fostered out as children but Lyanna had remained their father’s pillar and her son would not be pushed out of his home - not now that Ned had something to give him. Something of his own and with that, Ned hoped to finally please his sister’s shade.

He was so lost in thought that he hadn’t noticed her entrance until she cleared her throat. Graceful Elia, the only woman alive he trusted with his deepest secret. “Princess,” he said ashamedly when he stood. Robert’s actions still rankled him.

“You look like you need some rest.” She laughed as she crossed the room to take a seat opposite him. “I did not think your friend could get worse. Life, my lord, it seems is full of surprises.” 

“I could do with rest, my lady but a wedding and a royal visit seem to have such an effect, I’m told.” The small smile on his face faded. “I hear you were taken unwell, princess. How do you feel now?” Ned Stark had his own nightmares over the years and he understood why the sight of Robert’s banners would fill her with fear. 

“It is past,” she said smiling bravely. “I am fine...really. Stop giving me that look.” She scrunched her nose in laughter. “You have my congratulations on the match. I met with the happy couple earlier. May they have a long and happy union, my lord. I believe congratulations are in order for you as well.” She raised a fine eyebrow. “You are about to be the second most powerful man in the realm. Between you and I, allow me to say that King’s Landing could do with an honest man.”

Ned scoffed in laughter. “I do not want to go, Princess, but I must.”

“Must?”

Ned leaned back in his seat, wondering how much he could say. But if there was anyone in the world he could share his fears with, it was this woman, who in sixteen years had never risked his life or the life of the boy Ned swore to protect. “I have cause to believe Jon Arryn was murdered and I mean to find out the truth of the matter...and why.” Jon had no enemies and was an able Hand. 

She leaned back from him. “You have my condolences,” she said. “He must have been a good man to raise you.” _He raised Robert too_ , Ned reflected. None of Jon Arryn could be seen in him. “Why do you think he was killed?” 

“He was healthy and suddenly took ill. My good sister believes it was an unnatural death.” 

Elia furrowed her brows, letting the news wash over her. She walked away from him to the window and poured herself some wine. Ned wished he could see into her head, her thoughts. She knew the court more than he did but it had been so long since she was there as well. “Has she told you why she thinks that?” 

“No. Some things are too dangerous to ask by raven. Lady Lysa made quite the effort to ensure her missive could only be read and understood by her sister. So, you see, I must go and find out the truth of the matter myself. Lysa has sought refuge in The Eyrie. ” 

Elia nodded as she walked back. Sitting back down, with a melancholic tone asked,“Why didn’t she tell Robert? Jon Arryn was a father to him as well.”

Ned had wondered that himself. “Cat is her sister and the Lannisters are here.”

He watched Elia look around the room, deep in thought. “Must you take the children with you?” 

It was a question he’d asked himself so many times. “Sansa is to marry the prince and I cannot give the Lannister cause to doubt me. I want to keep Arya close.” His daughter, his loving, wild daughter, he could not leave her...not when she thought he didn’t love her. “Rickon is too young, Robb must rule in my absence and I would like Robert’s boys and my Bran to grow up as brothers as he and I once were. As hard as it is to believe Robert was not always the man he became.”

“I remember,” she said. “He would visit court when we were all children with his father. And then alone when my mother was a lady-in-waiting for Queen Rhaella. He was always loud, my lord, but never callous. I do not begrudge you the will to forge ties between your children. But I do have a question for you. You have mentioned Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, even little Rickon.” She put down her cup. “What of Jon?” 

“I have not neglected him, my lady, I assure you.” 

“He wants to go to the Wall.”  
“As many Starks have before him. There is great honour in that.” 

Shrewd brown eyes studied him. Her brows rose into incredulous arcs. “I do not believe that is what either of his parents would want for him, my lord. In another world he would have been a prince.” 

“But in this world he is not, my lady. And it would be treasonous for us to think otherwise.” 

“He will not go to the Wall, Ned.” Her calm demeanour was gone. She grabbed the handles of her seat tightly, and in the clenching of her jaw, he saw his own sister in her. “It is not my place but frankly, my lord, given the circumstances, I could not give a rat’s arse. If that boy has asked to leave Winterfell it is because he has been made to believe he must leave. That boy loves you, idolises you even. He loves his siblings. He and Robb have been inseparable since they were children. He and Arya, the same.” She exhaled loudly, lividly. “I have been polite, my lord. I have been quiet, Winterfell is your home and Lady Stark it’s mistress. But that boy is not just yours. He is my husband’s son, mine own children’s brother. If he has no place in Winterfell, in your absence, then he will have one with me.” 

_I am not unaware of what goes on in my home_ , Ned thought _and it appears neither is anyone else._ For years he hoped time would mellow Cat. Their children loved Jon, their household did as well. He was the perfect child, the perfect brother but Cat was blind to that, blinded by her ire at him. Ire a good lady could not direct at her husband. He knew she found no place in her heart for Jon but Ned had hoped he had made up for her lack of care for the first of his children. Jon was his in all the ways that matter. He was the first of his children he held in his arms. Jon’s request to go to the Wall had told him he fell short. The boy did not request it of his own volition. Ned knew that and it would appear the princess did too. Ned would see an end to this for good, it might be the last thing he ever did before he went south. Returning home was not guaranteed. 

“It was never my intention to accede to Jon’s request, princess,” he assured her. “He is a son of the north. His place is here. In fact, it’s why I called you here.” For a moment, he allowed himself to smile as he looked at his dream for spring spread out upon his desk. “I mean to raise new lords. I have thought of repopulating The Gift for a while. We have had prosperous trade with the Free Cities and I wish to return that coin to my people. Autumn and winter put pause to my plans. Even land, fertile land at that, could not lure northmen north during winter, not when they travel here to the Winter Town. But spring is here, my princess and I have the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch approval to populate The Gift. Queen Alysanne Targaryen gifted the land to the Night’s Watch. I do not doubt Robert would give me back the land and put it under Winterfell’s control once more. But the Starks have served the Wall for thousands of years. I would not take back what is theirs. The new lords will pay their taxes, not to Winterfell, but to the Night’s Watch and I mean to make Jon overlord of the new settlement.”

Tears and a smile sprung to Elia’s eyes, and he realised his own. “I would never forsake my sister’s trust, princess. I owe her a duty to protect him for my entire life. My brother chose at an age too young to spend his life at the Wall. He will never father a child of his own. Benjen was closest to Lyanna when we were children. I would have Jon remain close to him and to me, and when Robb’s time comes, to his brother in a land, and a castle all of his own.” _And free from Cat. I have failed him so many times before._

“Well,” she smiled tearfully, “I suppose I will not have to threaten you with war, my lord.” 

“Would you ever?” 

“There is little a mother would not do for her child, my lord. I took that boy into my heart the moment I held him in my arms at that tower. Now,” she said with a sigh. “What would you have of me?” 

“I must travel south...urgently as you know. I do not plan to tarry there but it means I will have to put my plans on hold. I must return to oversee the repopulation of The Gift. But in the meantime, I cannot take Jon to King’s Landing with me, not after…” he could not bring himself to say it. He cleared his throat. “I have spoken to Ethan already. I would ask, for my time away, to have Jon join your household.” _It is clear the poor child believes he has no place here_. “In my absence I cannot see to his needs-”

“Of course,” she laughed tearily. 

“It will not be for long,” he was keen to add, not that she would mind he realised, she had asked for this very thing so often. “I would give this Handship a year at most. If nothing else, I would use this settlement as my reason to return home. A Stark’s duty is to the north after all.” He allowed himself to grin. 

“And mine to the shade of Rhaegar for all his faults.” 

“You still love him.” 

“Love.” Elia laughed. “I love my husband, my lord, but Rhaegar was my friend and the father of the only children I would ever have. Jon is their brother. Now,” she picked up her wine again, “allow me to give you some advice. It goes without saying that you are now the second most powerful man in the realm. That has already earned you many enemies. Everywhere you turn favours will be asked of you. Depending on your response, the alliances of your king’s council will shift or solidify with you or against you. Conspiracies will be hatched all around you... _are_ being hatched I’m sure. Trust no one in that court. Pycelle belongs to Tywin Lannister, and now I presume his daughter. I do not know the Master of Coin beyond the fact that he grew up in your wife’s household.” That he loved her Ned knew. He dueled as little more than a child for Cat’s hand. 

“Renly and Stannis will be your allies in protecting their brothers’ interest but both work to opposite ends. Stannis has never been good at letting things go and starvation created an appetite for the finer things in life in Renly. At the centre of their tension is House Tyrell. Beware of them. Ser Barristan is a good and true man, even if he holds to his vows rigidly. Keep him close. That leaves Varys.” She took a sip of her wine. “He is the most dubious of them all.”

“He advised the Mad King until the end.”

“But he is good at his job. He will talk endlessly about his actions for the realm. I have often wondered the truth of his words but he has proven himself true when it mattered most.”

“And when was that, my lady?” 

“Oh, we will need much more wine, my lord but on your return, perhaps we will.” She smiled sadly. “You are a good man, Lord Stark. I want you to know that. A truly good man. One of the few I can say that about. King’s Landing is a dangerous place. Trust no one and if you ever need me and my brothers. Know this, we are at your service.”

There was a knock on the door. 

“Enter,” said Ned. 

“My lord,” Tomard announced. “Jon has returned with the prisoners… and a wolf.”

“Another wolf.” 

“A massive one.” 

“Winterfell, the home of wolves,” Elia laughed loudly. “I believe you have a son to see, my lord.” She put her arm through his. 

He arrived at the courtyard of the Inner Castle with Elia to see his boy’s return. Ben and Ethan were already there. 

Jon sat astride his horse with his wolf and Robb’s by his side. Beyond the castle grounds, Ned saw the larger wolf they had come across in the wolfswood...watching _him_ he realised. Something about it made a shiver run through his spine.

The prisoners were tied to their saddles. The bastard, for he had Roose’s pale eyes, sneered at Ned, held his gaze and gave him a wet-lipped smile. The other prisoner emitted a foul smell Ned could not ignore even from his place. Jon slid off his horse in their direction. 

“Father.” he bowed his head. “Uncle Benjen, Lord Glover, Princess Elia.” He kissed her hand and she, his cheek. “I told you I’d get back before the wedding,” he grinned proudly at Ned. “We caught them prowling on Hornwood lands since the lord and lady were away. Daryn had been hunting them already so we joined our search parties. Thankfully, no girls have been reported missing so we caught him in time.” 

“Good,” Ned said. “Well done.” He returned his gaze beyond the castle walls. The wolf was gone now. “That wolf...it followed you.”

“It helped us against the hounds. They killed two of Farlen’s hounds before he arrived. Arya was right, he is harmless and the pups like him. Arya thinks he’s their father.”

“Right.” He called out to Jory. “Have them taken to the dungeons. They will be tried after the wedding.” With the king in Winterfell, it would fall to Robert to judge them.

“See, Uncle Benjen,” he added proudly, “I told you I would make a great ranger.” 

“I don’t doubt you would.” Ben ruffled his hair. 

“I am proud of you, son,” Ned finally voiced. Jon’s cheeks flushed a bright red. “I do not doubt that you would be a man the Watch would be proud of.” He put his hand on his shoulder. “Walk with me, your uncle, Lord Glover and Princess Elia have some news to share with you.” 

The boy sat awkwardly opposite Ned, suddenly aware that they all sat staring at him. 

“You are wondering why I called you here.” 

“Yes, Father.” Ned heard him gulp. 

“Why do you want to go to the Wall, Jon?” 

Jon gave him a surprised look. “It is an honour to serve the Night’s Watch, my lord. Uncle Benjen is First Ranger. I could rise high there too.” 

“And you believe you could not here, is that so?” asked Benjen. 

“No...it’s just…” he looked down and so quietly said, “I’m a bastard.”

“That’s no reason to join the Watch.” 

“But I _want_ to join.”

“What if there was another option?” 

“Like what?” 

“What if you were a lord of your own castle?” 

“But I-” he stammered. “I-I’m a bastard...no one would marry their daughter to me.” 

“They would marry their daughters to the liege lord of the New Gift.” 

Jon looked at him wide-eyed, mouth agape, his face frozen in shock, as if he was waiting for Ned to tell him it was a joke. “I-what?” 

Ned couldn’t help but laugh. “Ben and I have been planning to repopulate the Gift for a while, Jon. I plan to raise a number of new lords to inhabit the land. And I can think of no one better to serve the interests of the Watch, not as a man of the Night’s Watch but as a man of Stark blood. You have the same education as your brother. Robb will rule Winterfell after me, you will rule the lands of The Gift and I will go to my grave knowing I have left the North in good hands.” 

“Father, I-” 

“Say thank you, lad, and be done with it.” Benjen’s eyes danced with mirth. 

Jon sprung up from his seat to throw his arms around Ned. For the second time that day, Ned felt his eyes glisten with tears. He kissed the boy’s head. “It’s the least you deserve, son. I am sorry for my neglect,” he added in a whisper. 

“You will be a great lord, Jon,” Elia exclaimed, rising to hug him before Ben and Ethan embraced him. 

“I must travel south soon,” Ned explained, “And it will take some time to think about which lordlings to raise. Until then, you will join Lord Glover and Princess Elia’s household. Learn what it means to rule over your own vassals from Ethan. I plan to return within the year. We will think about getting you a bride then.” 

“Now, enough of this talk.” Benjen announced throwing his arm over Jon’s shoulder. “I believe it is time for me to get well and truly drunk with my nephew.” 

“Vayon.” Ned called out to his steward when they left. “Please summon Cat. I mean to speak to her.” 

He was watching sparks fly and pop in the hearth when his wife arrived. 

“Cat. How are the children?” 

“Well, my lord. Sansa is having tea with the princess. Robb is with the lordlings who have already arrived. He would make you so proud if you saw him with them.” Cat sat on his desk, taking his hand in hers. “He is so good with all the lords, Ned.” 

“I am always proud of him.” 

“Bran sparred with Prince Tommen, Arya is...staying out of trouble and Rickon sat through an entire lesson with Maester Luwin today.” 

“And you, how are you?” 

“I cannot wait for this wedding to be over. I want my castle back to myself,” she laughed. “I miss the quiet and the order.” 

“Good. I have spoken to Jon.” 

“Oh.” 

“Yes.” 

“And.”

“I am not letting him go.” 

“The boy _wants_ to go to the Wall, Ned.” She clenched her hands into a fist. 

“And I do not want him to go there.”

“I will not have him here. He is your son. Your responsibility. Not mine.” She pulled away from him, sounding more angry than shocked, but his fury was on him too. 

“Winterfell is his home, my lady. He belongs here as much as any child of ours.” 

“I will not look after _your_ bastard. If you insist on him not going to the Wall. He will go with you to King’s Landing. I will not have him here. I will not.” She hugged herself, tears springing in her eyes but in that moment, all Ned saw was his own dying sister crying for her babe. 

“He cannot go to court, my lady. You know that as well as I.”

“You do him no favours if you leave him here.” She moved to walk out of the room.  
“How can you be so damnably cruel?” 

“Me?” She spun round. “You are the one who broke your marriage vows to father a bastard. And if that was not enough you proclaimed your shame to all the world. What will he do if he’s here? I have a place in my heart for only my own children. Robb will be lord after you. And I will not have a bastard who may one day usurp my grandchildren under my roof.”  
“ _My_ roof, my lady. I am the Stark in Winterfell.”

She reeled away from him as if he had slapped her. “We have failed. Both of us. We have made one child believe we would be better off if she was dead.” Her words still rang loud in his ears. _None of you care about me. Maybe if that wolf did you all the favour of eating me you could all continue with your lives._

“Arya has a penchant for drama.” 

“You did not see her, my lady. I did.” Ned exhaled loudly, feeling the tension spread throughout him. He stood up to walk over to her. “I may seem clueless, but I am not ignorant of what goes on underneath my roof. You are my wife, Cat. I love you. You are the lady of this castle. You have a say in what happens here and I understand that you are hurt by my actions but you cannot take your anger at me out on Jon.” 

“I will not have your bastard here, Ned. I cannot,” she sobbed. “What will he do besides sit around here?” 

“Learn to rule.” 

“What?” 

“I mean to make him a lord of his own lands. If you will not have him here, he will have his own lands and his own home.” 

“You cannot be serious. He is a bastard.” 

“He is the blood of Winterfell, my lady.” 

“Where?” 

“The New Gift.” 

“That land belongs to the Night’s Watch.” 

“And my brother is it’s next commander.” Ned couldn’t contain his smile. Benjen was a sure shot for command after Lord Commander Mormont’s tenure. Securing a steady income for the Watch would guarantee the position was his. Deny it as Ben may, Ned owed his brother a duty too. He would see to it that Ben lived to his potential, limited as it may be by the Watch.

“What of Bran? Bran is your trueborn son.” 

“To hear Bran tell it, he wants to be a knight of the Kingsguard.”

“A child’s fancy. Will you truly give your bastard land that is your son’s?” 

“I mean to grant Bran Moat Cailin.” 

“A ruin.” 

“The gateway to the North. Besides...at least there is a structure to build around. The New Gift lies abandoned.” 

“Do you hate me that much?” 

“This is not about you, my lady. It is about my duty to my family. But...since you will not abide having Jon under my roof, he will await my return at Deepwood Motte.” 

“Princess Elia.” Cat grit her teeth. “Of course.” 

“Now, if you will excuse me, my lady, I believe my brother and my boy are toasting his new lordship. I mean to join them.” 

As he walked away, Ned Stark felt truly relieved for the first time in a long time. _I will never fail you again, sister. I promise._

He made his way to the glass gardens. _Lyanna always loved flowers._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I believe, we all owe our boy Ned a bit of an apology lol. I’ve been referencing that map for a few chapters now lmao. In canon he pushed back his plan to settle people in The Gift until spring. Jon reflects on that in canon when he’s thinking about how he could have settled down with Ygritte. Isn’t it just miraculous that it’s spring now lmao.
> 
> If you believe Ned would not call her cruel, he does in canon and I believe he’d have gone further if Maester Luwin had not butted in with talk of the Wall.
> 
> I also believe that he went to King’s Landing because he thought he owed Jon Arryn a duty. After all, the man once declared for him. Even if Cat had to coax him into it.


	22. Elia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Teeny tiny chapter

**Elia**

He pinned her against the door the moment it shut. Elia moaned into his mouth. Ethan pulled back, gasping for breath. Before she knew it his hands were travelling up her skirts and through the layers wedged between them. 

“Bed,” she panted, tugging at his breeches. 

“Here,” he grunted, “now!” In a single jolting movement he entered her. Elia clung to him, powerless, unable to do anything but take all he gave her. There was an urgency to his lovemaking, a scorching heat that spilled over from him and into her, causing her to lose her breath and manage nothing but a quiver of his name. All thoughts and guilt flew out of her. Only he existed. Nothing else. No one else. 

Later, much later, he moved a wisp of hair that was stuck to her cheek. “I love you, Elia,” he declared. “...more than any man has ever loved a woman.” His brown eyes bore deep into her soul, so heavy was his gaze her very bones seemed to melt when she saw herself reflected in his eyes. Her man had never been one for great declarations. All these years she clung to his constancy, his honesty and care like a shipwrecked person did to a spar. Elia burrowed against his chest, unable to meet his eyes. The grief of an event yet unhappened tore through her heart. She cradled her head in her hands, unable to meet his gaze. Her son was in Winterfell this night and when the news of Aegon’s conquest came, she knew there would be hurt enough to go around. _I will tell him,_ she kept telling herself. _I will tell him, just not yet._ Elia knew her husband. He was a Stark man...had been a Stark man long before she came into his life. He had ridden down to King’s Landing with Brandon Stark when the heir to Winterfell had called for Rhaegar to come out and die. She knew that for all his love for her he could not keep a secret from his Stark lord. And though Elia knew neither man would harm her son, Ned Stark might prevent him from entering his lands again for the risk it posed. She could not go years without seeing her son’s face again. She had seen so little of him as it was. And Ethan...she knew he would be hurt, _so hurt. I can’t,_ she told herself, _I cannot when Robert is here. I can’t. He laughed at the bodies of my dead children_ . _Ethan will understand. He has to._ Elia realised she was crying.

As for her son, and her nieces, Elia could not decide whether she wanted to embrace them or wring their necks. _Both,_ she thought. Only youth combined with power could make one so fool-hardy. 

She had been with her husband, Jon, Arya, and Benjen Stark in the small hall, drinking to Jon’s lordship. Robert, she learned, had taken to drinking and wenching in the Great Hall. Catelyn Stark had come and gone offering _congratulations_ dipped in such venom, it was quite the surprise the boy hadn’t dropped dead. For a moment, Elia understood the glee her brother had gotten out of ruffling the woman. She followed her to a quiet corner to remind her that Jon was a member of _her_ household now and that he was not alone. For good measure she reminded her a king was in residence and kings have been known to legitimise bastards. “Think of it, my lady, three Starks ruling lands in the north. Wouldn’t that be just marvellous?” It was quite the effort not to burst out laughing at the way Catelyn Stark’s face crumbled. 

Bran Stark came careering into the hall then. 

“Princess!” he huffed, exhausted from his run. 

“Take it easy, son,” Ethan laughed. “Just _what_ have you been doing in the hay?”

“I was climbing…” He paused to pant, holding onto the table for support. Elia began fishing out the straw from his hair. 

“Of course.” Benjen rolled his eyes. “Most children crawl _then_ walk, princess. I believe this one was born knowing how to climb. I’ve never seen a monkey but I hear they’re not much different from our Bran.” 

“Then I jumped into the hay rather than climb down all the way,” the Bran in question answered by way of explanation. “I saw the banners. Prince Oberyn is coming.” 

_Finally,_ Elia thought as she sprung to her feet even as dread knotted itself in her gut. Her brother was...not the best in environments like this. He would have to see the man who gained most from her children’s deaths. Bloodshed was not guaranteed but not beyond the realms of possibility. Elia had missed him enough to throw caution to the wind. She wanted to speak to him more than anything else. She needed Varys’ whispers more than ever now and she needed her brother above all else. 

The red sun, golden spear and orange field of House Martell belonged where it billowed against the setting sun. _Robert’s end is nigh,_ she thought with hope. _His sun will set as well, and the dawn will belong to my child._

They were still too far out for Elia to see their faces but the Dornish party comprised a group of four - three of them women judging from the long braided hair of two of them and the golden curls of the third. 

“It’s Princess Arianne,” squealed Arya. With three simple words dread creeped over Elia like a chill. _Arianne is in Norvos._ The golden curls were Tyene’s. _Also in Norvos._ The third woman was Septa Lemore and the blue hair….Elia felt like no viper, no sun or spear, merely a lamb approaching her slaughter. The difference between them was that the lamb knew not that death approached. Elia did. Where the lamb ran mattered not, the knife came all the same and as her son’s party rode forward the lamb’s legs became heavier and heavier until it succumbed, waiting for the butcher’s knife...waiting to be nothing more than meat, blood and pieces of bone. _What Tywin had intended for her child, it seemed he wanted to do to himself._ She could only watch from Winterfell’s battlements as he did so. 

“Looks like Oberyn sent his children.” 

_Where is he?_

Like the lamb's, her feet would not move either. Her son’s purple met her brown as he entered the gates. Two scarlet spots came to stain his cheeks.

Far away in the distance, she thought she heard her husband’s voice shout, “Welcome back north, son.” She only had eyes for Lemore’s look of apology. Arianne had climbed down from her horse while a groom led it away. She was sharing an embrace with Arya. 

“Elia.” Ethan’s hand was on her arm. “Are you alright?” She gave him a smile and an affirming nod even as she felt her innards twist violently. 

“I’m not sure you remember me.” 

“Of course I do.” She heard Jon chuckle as she came down the steps. “I don’t meet blue-haired people every day. Princess Elia read us a story about dragons. This is Bran.”

“My, you’ve grown up,” her son laughed. “The last time I saw you, you were stumbling around the castle on uneasy feet. Though you knew how to climb up chairs with little effort.”

“Princess Elia.” Aegon _Sand_ bowed. He took her hand to his lips the moment she appeared before him and placed a small scrap of parchment in her hand. Elia clutched it, positing it into her skirts as she fixed them.

“My nieces.” Elia extended her arms out to them. “Have you lost your minds?” She pinched each one. 

“We’ve had quite the tour of the kingdoms, dear aunt. Aegon wanted to see the seven kingdoms.” 

“Well, we’ve only been to three of them,” Tyene corrected. Her smile was as sweet as a summer sun. Elia was a storm. _They are mad. They are truly mad._

Arya was looking at Lemore and whispering in Jon’s ear. He whispered something back in hers that made her giggle. 

“I’m sorry,” Lemore whispered in Elia’s own ear when they embraced. “I couldn’t let them do this alone. Gerold, Arthur and Os travelled the Riverlands and the Vale with us but the North was too dangerous for them. And just as well.” Elia followed Lemore’s eyes to the stag and the lion draped across the walls. 

“Where’s Oberyn?”

“Isn’t he here?”

Elia did not think her guts could be wrenched anymore. Until they were. _Where are you little brother?_

“Well you’ll have to tell me all about your trip, son,” Ethan said, pulling Egg into an embrace. _Son. If only._ There was so much of Rhaegar in this boy. He was there in the arch of his brows, in his eyes and hair and smile. _So much of him is me too_. His nose was hers, the tan in his skin, and the single dimple in his cheek. For a growing boy even the two years they spent apart made a difference. She saw the shadow of a beard run across his cheeks and nearly cried. She could not. 

“We’ll have to get you a room in the Smoking Log,” she blurted. “Winterfell is too full.” _I cannot have them know you’re here. It will only take them one look to see Rhaegar in you._ Ned Stark did not know Rhaegar like Jaime or Robert...or Cersei. 

“We tried. They only had one room left. Drey and Garin have taken it.”

“We wanted to be _close_ to the festivities. Aegon told us all about Dothraki weddings, I must tell you later, Aunt Elia. Oh the possibilities.” Tyene giggled as she reached into her sleeves. Elia often wondered how someone as sweet as Lemore had given birth to her niece. Then she’d look into her eyes and see the viper there. Every one of Oberyn Martell’s daughters, as different as they were, had his eyes and his fire. 

“Some of winter town’s houses lay empty,” she had begun to say when Jon spoke at the same time as her. 

“There’s a spare pallet in our room. You’ll only have to sleep on it for two nights. Then you can take Robb’s bed after the wedding.” Her son smiled and for a moment Elia’s fury abated as water cooled fire. 

“And you two can share with me.” Arya took her nieces’ arms. More mischievously, she added, “Jeyne and Beth can find somewhere else to sleep...and Septa Mordane too. She’s always talking about the virtuous host. You can join us too, septa. Our septa will make way for you.”

“I don’t mean to impose-“

“No, you’re not. Septa Mordane will agree with me. And you can all meet my wolf. I named her Nymeria.” Arya’s voice faded as she walked them to the Great Keep where the Stark’s apartments were located.

“I’ll have your things taken up to our room,” Jon said before he too dashed away with Egg. Elia stood in the courtyard of Winterfell with her husband. Eyes as cold as ice bore into her son’s back as he walked away with his brother. She could not disparage him. In front of Ethan she had no cause and in front of those who joined him she could not. He was their king. Being the mother of a prince was one thing, of a king quite another but the scariest of them all was being the mother of a child who’d walked into the lion’s den. Her worst dreams had come to life. 

The parchment had two dragons on it. One black and the other red. Elia fed it to the fire. It was no bad omen. Dragons were fire made flesh. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do most of my writing on weekends and occasionally on a work day. I’m writing something professionally for work & find that zaps me out atm. (I wish it was fiction lol). 
> 
> This was supposed to be an Aegon chapter but I wanted to get Elia’s reaction first. Things went from 0-100 for her over a single sunset. 
> 
> My headcanon is Jon & Arya were whispering about how different Lemore was from Mordane when they saw her.
> 
> Tyene as a character terrifies me lmao. Imagine being so dangerous you take your uncles hand to kiss it and the maester’s first thought is to look for any cuts where you could have pierced him with poison.
> 
> Depending on how much I manage to write tomorrow, Oberyn makes his appearance and is (surprisingly) super chilled. 
> 
> If this was a modern AU I can imagine Cat & Ethan writing a Reddit post asking AITA when/if they decide to leave Elia & Ned looool. At what point are you no longer hiding a secret but living a lie lmao


	23. Aegon

**Aegon**

The orange ball of fire coloured the sky in hues of a red the colour of blood. The colour of the rubies his father wore to The Trident, the last battle of his life. Aegon had visited the site, held the sand in his hands and mourned the father he never knew. They called the place where he died the Ruby Ford now...and behind those grey walls was the man who killed him. 

Aegon had not intended to visit Winterfell...not at first. They landed at Maidenpool, home of the Motoons. Lord William Motoon’s brother, Myles, had been his father’s friend and squire. He died at the Battle of the Bells at the hands of Robert Baratheon. Arthur and Os remembered him fondly and while they had a yearning to see old faces, they chose to stay at an inn outside the pink stone walls of Maidenpool. At the Trident the castle of the Darrys lay half a day’s ride from the Ruby Ford. Ser Willem had lived with them until his death and Ser Jonothor had died at The Trident with the Targaryen host. They had to avoid Castle Darry too. From Saltpans they went to Gulltown and Egg got to see the city where Lord Grafton had raised his banners for House Targaryen. He too died at the hands of Robert Baratheon. 

Aegon’s only intention in the North was to visit his mother. Then they got the news at White Harbor that Robb Stark was marrying the granddaughter of the Lord of New Castle...and that the usurper was at Winterfell. ‘ _For the wedding,’_ some said. ‘ _For other business,”_ others countered. 

“Your Grace, you cannot do this.” Ser Gerold’s voice was firm. 

“Let me go instead,” Ser Arthur said. “I will bring you back his head.” 

“That is too messy,” Tyene quipped sweetly. “If it’s his life you want, I’ll give it to you, _little brother._ His life, his wife’s, all three of his little whelps and all without a drop of blood.” 

Arianne only took his hand. “Are you sure?” she asked. 

“I only want to see,” Aegon replied. “Uncle Oberyn will be there, he will have news from The Spider. We’ll know why the usurper travelled this far North then.” 

“It’s obvious, Your Grace,” Ser Oswell told him. “Jon Arryn is dead. He comes to seek a new Hand.” Aegon had hoped that was not the case. A war against Eddard Stark would be a replay of the rebellion and the alliance that brought down House Targaryen. And this time the Lannisters would not sit things out. Aegon was not sure they would have the numbers for such a war. 

His worst fears were confirmed by the tavern owner of The Smoking Log. Ned Stark had accepted the Handship. He could hear Jon Connington spit the words. _‘Birds of a feather flock together. They are usurpers, the lot of them and only a fool would trust them. Kill them, son, and be done with it.’_

“I will come with you,” Drey volunteered at White Harbor. “My sword is second to well..many” 

“Many hundred,” Garin corrected. 

“That is true,” Drey laughed. “Even so, I promise to give my life for yours.” 

“And mine, for all it’s worth. Though I am no warrior.” 

“Soon we will be of one flesh.” Arianne squeezed his hand. 

“Well, you _are_ my little brother. I best look after you.” 

And so their party was reduced to five. Haldon had stayed in Pentos with Lady Ashara and Illyrio Mopatis. The man fancied himself half in love with her, Ashara, on the other hand, merely enjoyed being somewhere other than the isolated hills of Norvos. Egg missed her so much. It was a balm on his heart to have Lemore travel with him, she too had given years of her life to see to his instruction in the mysteries of the faith. 

“You must have taken leave of your senses if you believe I’ll let you walk into that pit alone.”

“Den, mother. A den of lions and wolves...dead lions...though I like the wolves.” _Six._

The silver fist of House Glover draped over the walls alongside the banners of every northern house whose people graced the wedding. Above them flew the direwolf and the merman and above them the prancing stag and the golden lion. Strangely, Aegon had felt no fear, only intrigue. Beyond the walls was a man he knew only by reputation. He would meet him soon. Aegon eyes moved back to the silver fist. _Mother._ It was only at that thought that he felt a sadness wash over him. She was sharing a castle with their enemy. To Aegon, Robert Baratheon was an idea. To her, he was the monster of her nightmares. 

His mother looked down at him from the battlements, the disappointment ebbed from her. _Disappointment and fear._ His horse wickered, much like his heart, but he set it aright. 

In front of him, stood Arya Stark and his brother. Arya had grown out of her gawkiness and his brother...it must have been him. Aegon just knew. Jon had grown to have no hint of House Targaryen in him. He shared the long face and the grey eyes of his cousin. So different was he from the younger boy who stood beside them, red haired, blue-eyed and smiling. 

Arya hugged him first. “Welcome to Winterfell,” she whispered. As she moved away she grinned conspiratorially at him. “I’ve gotten better. I’ll show you later.” 

“I’m not sure you remember me,” he said to Jon as he extended his hand. 

“Of course I do.” His brother’s smile was resplendent. “I don’t meet blue-haired people every day. Princess Elia read us a story about dragons. This is Bran.” 

Aegon had remembered him as a child who was just mastering how to walk. He carried a wooden sword now. 

Then his mother appeared. Fearful. 

He handed her the parchment. The decision he made haphazardly at White Harbor. The black and red dragons would unite. The chasm created by Aegon IV would be fixed by Aegon VI. Whether that would be enough, he could not say but he could not turn down swords. Not now. 

Aegon looked around for his uncle...for the sun and spear of Sunspear. Lord Glover pulled him into a hug. He was a jovial man who made his mother happy. 

“We’ll have to get you a room in the Smoking Log,” his mother suggested. “Winterfell is too full.” Her eyes misted with unshed tears and in the line of her lips he saw only concern. The despair was rooted in her eyes. _I only wanted to see, mother._

“We tried,” Arianne answered for him. “They only had one room left. Drey and Garin have taken it.” That was true though they could have tried harder.  
“We wanted to be close to the festivities. Aegon told us all about Dothraki weddings, I must tell you later, Aunt Elia. Oh the possibilities.” Tyene had been planning the deaths of Robert and his family since White Harbor. Every few hours she’d suggest a new form of death to visit upon them. Each time he’d remind her it was not yet time.

“Some of Winter Town’s houses lay empty-“

“There’s a spare pallet in our room. You’ll only have to sleep on it for two nights. Then you can take Robb’s bed after the wedding.” Aegon couldn’t help but smile. He’d longed for a brother for so long. He hoped Viserys could have been that brother. _I’ve always had a brother,_ he told himself. _One who doesn’t even know me,_ he rectified. _He only extends kindness to a stranger._ The thought saddened him. 

He sent his mother an apologetic look before he followed his little brother into the Great Keep. In front of him he could see Arya lead Arianne, Tyene and Lemore away. 

“Where’s the king?” he asked.

Jon gave him an unreadable look. “He’s probably in the Great Hall. If he’s not there, his rooms are up ahead.” Aegon noted crimson cloaked guards whose armour sported steel Lannister lions walking through the halls.

“It looks like a Lannister invasion,” he joked.

“These are only a few of them. You’d think the Lannisters ruled the land and not the king.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s surrounded by them. _Their_ sigil adorns everything instead of his.”

“You don’t hold them in high esteem.”

“The king is…not what I expected.”

“How do you mean?”

Jon appraised him for a moment. “We grew up hearing about Robert Baratheon, a man with no peers. The Demon of the Trident.” He sighed with disillusionment. “Whoever the man who has come here is...he’s not the legend who killed Rhaegar Targaryen. I was expecting a hero.”

“Perhaps he never was one.” The words slipped out.

“Perhaps you’re right.” Jon agreed to his surprise. “Princess Elia and my father don’t often talk about the war. Your father told us what happened to your cousins.” _How funny is life,_ Egg thought. _We are both claiming an uncle for a father._

He cleared his throat as he opened an oak door. “We’re sharing Robb’s room at the moment.” The room had six pallets in it. No one was there. Jon put down Aegon’s chest. 

“Ah, Jeyne.” He heard Arya’s voice outside their room. “You will have to find somewhere else to sleep tonight. The princess and Tyene are staying in our room tonight.” Aegon saw Jon laugh before he stepped out to join his cousin. 

“You can’t just throw me out-“

“Now, now,” Arya said airily. “Would you ask a princess to sleep amongst the servants?” Her snigger was loud enough for them to hear. “The two cousins re-entered the room flanked by two wolves. One white and the other grey. Aegon stepped back. 

“There’s no need to fear,” Jon assured him with a smile. “This is Ghost. He wouldn’t harm my friend.”

“And that’s Nymeria. They’re our pups.”

“Pups?” They were of a size with large hounds already. 

“They’re direwolves.”

“You have _direwolves_ for pets.”

The grey wolf tilted its head to look at him. “Old Nan says they’re gifts from the Old Gods to look over us. Anyway, I came to say that I’ve sent Arianne, Tyene and her mother to the hot pools.” She turned to Jon, “With Septa Mordane.” With that she sniggered again. “After such a long journey, I think the hot pools will serve to soothe you way better than any bath. I thought you might want to join them there.” 

Beneath Winterfell’s Guest House lay three steaming pools loomed over by a moss-covered wall. Across from them was the Heart Tree of Winterfell’s godswood. As he was guided to the hot pools, he could not help but feel that the tree was staring into his very soul. If a tree could stare, this one was. Aegon was sure of it and he felt as if it knew every one of his secrets. It was judging him with cold eyes and appraising him against standards he knew not. Arianne, Tyene and Lemore were already as naked as their name days. He’d seen Lemore naked after a bath enough times not to stir at the sight of the septa or her daughter. Lemore had oft said, “The Mother and the Father made us in their image. We should glory in our bodies, for they are the work of gods.” As for Arianne, the sight was always one for sore eyes. They had not been... _together_ very often through their trip. They often shared rooms and cabins with their party. 

What did shock him was the moment he stripped down, his own mother walked in. The fury radiated off of her. 

“Would you have me die before I see you on your throne?” She removed her boots to dip her own toes into the hot springs. 

Aegon looked above them where the Heart Tree must have stood. 

“I have my guards up there. You will neither be heard nor interrupted,” she answered him. _Do the northern gods hear us?_ He wondered. 

“Mother...I-” No answer would pass his lips. “I-”

“What is the meaning of your parchment?” 

And so Aegon began to recall the words of Jon Connington from The Spider half a year past. “The Spider says war is on the horizon, mother. He says that the Lannisters plan to kill Robert, that Stannis and Renly hate the Lannisters and each other as well. Soon, Westeros will be ripe for the picking. Illyrio offered to buy the service of the Golden Company on my behalf to help me take back the throne.” Aegon paused, expecting an interruption from his mother but she let him speak. Calculating eyes watched him.

“What does he want out of it.”

“To be my Master of Coin.” 

“Will you accept his offer?” 

Aegon felt as if he was being tested. Arianne, Tyene and the Septa faded away. It was as if he and his mother were the only people there. “No.” 

“So how will you unite the black and red dragons.”

“I mean to offer lands to the commanders. I do not want to be beholden to Illyrio Mopatis no more than I should be. This way if I refuse to grant him the position, he will hold me no enmity.” 

“He still might.”

“I might give him other honours. I would not let him alone, perhaps I’d even make him Master of Coin but I would do so on my own terms and not on his. I...just want options and I wanted to get to know the land before I arrived.” 

“You cannot trust sellswords.” 

“They want to come home, Mother. I will give them the opportunity. And we have the ships to bring them to Westeros, all 10,000 men and their horses and elephants.”

“They will need payment too - promises of land are not enough on their own. We will need to pay them some. Leave that to me,” she said cryptically. “I will discuss it with Oberyn when he arrives.” 

“Where _is_ my father?” 

“Your guess is as good as mine. He should have been here a long time ago.”

“Mother..” He moved closer to her feet, kissing them. “I hadn’t meant to come here at this time. It just happened. I wanted to see you.” For all the vulnerability he felt, Aegon was thankful for the dark waters of the hot pools that hid his nakedness. He felt too exposed at that moment. _It’s only my family,_ he told himself. For so long he had been only Egg but the past months, the plotting, the decisions that awaited him required him to become Aegon Targaryen, king of a lost throne. And he had not yet quite mastered it. 

“Then we saw the banners and...I couldn’t help it. If I am to face these people one day in battle or to have them stand by my side, I need to know them. I only came to look. I promise I will make no trouble.” 

His mother cupped her cheek. “I am so happy to see you.” Tears flooded her eyes again. “To see you all,” she added. “I am just fearful. It’s too dangerous Aegon. Any one of them may see your father in you. Robert would not let you live and I could not live through losing you once more.”

“You won’t have to, Aunt Elia. I will kill them all.”

“Tyene, please.” Septa Lemore sounded exasperated. 

“Why not? They are all here. We will never have a better opportunity.” 

“It will solve nothing, Tyene,” his mother sighed. “He has two brothers - one as stubborn as a mule and as immovable as a mountain and another who fancies himself Robert reborn.” 

“Can we count on Ned Stark?” Arianne asked. “He is to marry his daughter to the usurper’s son.”

“What?” 

“He refused Arya for Trystane. He said his daughters were too young but that was only a year ago. Now Robert comes knocking and he would be the usurper’s man and have his daughter be queen to the usurper’s spawn even after all you’ve done for him, keeping his secrets!” 

“Arya is to marry Robert’s son?” 

“Sansa-”

“What secrets?” Tyene’s eyes came alive with mischief. “Know a man’s secrets and he is beholden to you.”

If Elia Martell’s look of disappointment and anger could reduce him to cinders, Aegon would be ashes floating away in the wind. He had told Arianne never to speak of Jon again. His brother was not to be a bargaining chip. It was not fair. 

“There are no secrets to be shared.” Mother’s voice was iron. “Please, if you would leave me with Aegon. I would like a moment alone with him.” 

Lemore wrapped herself in a towel and began to dress, Tyene joined her, dressing slowly. “You stay,” his mother ordered Arianne as she began to leave the pool.

When his mother ensured they were alone she turned to the two of them. “You told her.” 

“I didn’t mean to...I would never say it. I promised Aunt Elia. I just...I just meant we could scare him with revealing it. I would never reveal it myself.” 

“You would destroy a good man and a boy who has done no wrong.” 

“How is he good if he would be Hand to the usurper?”

“Not everything is as it appears.”  
“Mother,” Aegon interjected. “If Sansa marries Robert’s son, Ned Stark will be tied to the Baratheons and we will have four kingdoms against us before we land.”

“How long did Varys say it would take for his fall?” 

“Around a year. Six months ago.” 

“The betrothal is to last a year. The marriage is not guaranteed.”

“That doesn’t mean he will side with us.”

“If the Lannister woman kills Robert…”his mother sighed wearily. “Even then he would not. Not while Stannis and Renly live. Perhaps the Lannisters will do us a favour and kill them too.”

“Would they?”

Mother laughed bitterly. “Ask the Reynes and the Tarbecks that. They had you and Rhaenys killed didn’t they? And now Jon Arryn.”

“They killed him?” Egg knew little about the Lord of the Eyrie other than the fact that he had risen in rebellion for his wards, that he had governed the realm for Robert and that he had seen to Rhaegar’s cremation to prevent further desecration of his body. For all his dislike of the man, he begrudgingly respected him for that one act. 

“So says Lady Arryn. Ned Stark is travelling south to find out the truth of this matter.” Mother stood up, dusting her skirts and began to don her boots. 

“Anyway, Oberyn will bring news. I know it. Enough of this for now. I must return to my husband. Fortunately for us, there are hundreds of people milling around this castle to mean that you will never have to interact with Robert and his court. For this one night and until I return to the castle tomorrow attract no attention.” She began to walk away when she turned round. “One more thing.” Her eyes were hard on Arianne. “If any harm comes to that boy. I will never forgive you.” 

Arianne turned to him with tears in her eyes. “I didn't mean to say I would harm him, Egg. You have to believe me.” 

“You also promised never to mention it again. What do you think would happen to my brother? You should have thought.” He walked out of the pool and dressed himself. Arianne did the same. Silence reigned between them. She weaved her fingers between his as they walked out. Arya Stark’s eyes went to their joined hands the moment they walked out of the Guest House. She was sitting at a bench in the small hall with Jon, and some young men he did not recognise. One was black haired, the other had a bright head of red hair. 

“What are you doing?” he whispered.

“Holding the hand of the man I love.”

“I’m supposed to be your bastard cousin.”

“And I am not answerable to anyone here.” 

Arya waved at them. “Join us!” 

“Princess,” the black haired one bowed, leering at Arianne with a cocky smile. He kissed her hand. “It has been a draught here these past years without you, dear one.” Aegon balled his hands into a fist. When he looked beyond him, he noticed Arya’s eyes on his hands. _The girl misses nothing._

“Theon.” 

“Aegon!” The redhead said with a smile. Aegon stared at him, unsure. “It’s me!” 

Recognition hit him like a ton of mud bricks. “Robb!” He looked just like Bran. “Forgive me, it has been so long. Congratulations on your wedding.” The black haired man was still too close to Arianne. 

“This is Theon Greyjoy,” Arianne said by way of introduction. “The heir to Pyke.” _Lord Stark’s hostage._

“This is my cousin, Aegon.” 

“The Red Viper’s natural son.” 

“Ah, another Dornish bastard.” 

“He’s sore that Sarella is a better archer,” Arya explained.  
“Don’t you have other places to be Horseface?” 

“Theon!” Jon growled. Arya placed a hand on his shoulder. Jon took her hand in his and lowered it underneath the table. “I’m with my family and Aegon and Arianne are _my_ friends. Don’t _you_ have other places to be?” She stuck her tongue out at him. 

“What are we celebrating?” Arianne inquired, gesturing at the jugs of ale and summer wine all around the table. 

“The new Lord of The Gift.” 

“Who’s that then?” 

Arya threw her arms around Jon. They sported identical grins. 

“I didn’t know there was a castle there.” 

“There isn’t.” Jon grinned. “I will be the overlord of the land. I will hold it in Father’s name and will pay my taxes to the Night’s Watch. That way I stay close to my uncle Benjen.” His happiness was infectious. The land was bequeathed by a Targaryen, that it would stay in the family, made Aegon happy. _Until I give you Dragonstone._ Though Arianne often reminded him Dragonstone would go to their child. _Perhaps you will hold The Gift for me, brother._

“Congratulations, brother.” Egg embraced him before he realised what he said. “I mean,” he stuttered. “As one bastard to another.” Arianne looked at him with amusement. _And you thought I would be the first person to spill the beans,_ her eyes seemed to say. 

He sat next to Jon and learnt that he was to leave Winterfell after the wedding for Deepwood Motte to join the Glover household for a year. Jon spoke with such reverence of Mother, Egg could hardly help but note, “You care for the princess.”

“She has always been good to me,” Jon answered him with a smile. “She used to make me cloaks, read me stories, cheer me on when I was training in the yard. I don’t know what it means to have a mother...but…” he trailed off. “Princess Elia is a good woman.”

“She is.” 

That night Aegon drank himself silly with his brother, the Starks and his betrothed. Tyene joined them, bringing Drey and Garin with her. The more he drank, the more he found Theon Greyjoy a more palatable figure. The man flirted with every woman, not just Arianne. Aegon laughed more than he had in a long time, though what was so funny he could not say. The last thing he remembered was stumbling arm in arm with his brother back to the room they would share that night. 

The drink that had been so intoxicating the night before, only added to his nausea in the morning. His head felt fit to split open and judging by the grey faces of his companions he was not alone. They all looked sickly. 

“Even your little bride will not want to bed you looking like this.” 

“I’m not getting married until tomorrow!” Robb threw a pillow at the Greyjoy heir. 

Later that morning, much later, Arya approached him after he broke his fast with Drey, Garin, Arianne, Tyene and, unusually enough, the Greyjoy heir. For all that he reminded him of Viserys, Theon Greyjoy did not have the cruelty that so characterised his uncle. He laughed easily and smirked as if a joke had been made at the world’s expense - one only he knew of. Arya asked him to practice swords with her. “I’ve gotten better and most of the knights rode out with the king earlier for a ride. The yard would be less busy.” 

“Leave off, Horseface. The man is as tired as we are. Don’t you have sewing to do?” 

“It’s fine,” Aegon said, noting the scarlet spots that came to her cheeks whenever the Greyjoy heir called her that name. “Let’s see how good you’ve gotten.” He had been hoping to see his mother first thing that morning but she had yet to come to the castle. Perhaps he could catch her as she entered through the East Gate, the gate to Winter Town. 

By the time they made it to the courtyard, Jon and Robb were already there. Their wolves sat on their haunches watching them. Bran was there with his as well. He sat with Robb’s green-haired bride. When she saw him, she laughed and said, _“It’s good to know I will not be the only person at this wedding with unusual hair.”_

“Remember,” Aegon said, holding a wooden sword as they practiced. “You’ll only have the one chance. Either you be quick and take your opponent by complete surprise or you’ll be dead.” 

“I can be quick.” And she was. She had gotten better with her strokes and parries, though she could not defend with a shield while striking with the sword. 

When she exerted herself to exhaustion, he began to teach her things she _could_ do like how to disable an opponent who grabbed her from behind. Judging by Bran’s later howl she had got the hang of things quite quickly.  
“You need to put more force behind it if you’re in actual danger,” he clarified. “You should hit them over the knee or behind it. You should hear the bone crack. But don’t do that on Bran. Just remember it.” 

“Just like a Dornishman,” he heard a droopy eyed man with a red beard spit in laughter to a companion with a half-burnt face. “ All they do is raid and hide. No wonder if they train with girls and wooden swords.” The only identifying insignia upon his body was the black hanged man on a blue field on his tunic. _A Trant of Gallowsgrey in the Stormlands._ He was unarmoured but for the sword he carried. The other’s sigil was three black dogs on a yellow field. _A Clegane. Like The Mountain._

“If you ask nicely, I might teach you too how to hold your sword,” Aegon answered him. The clanging of Jon and Robbs’ swords, as well as Theon and Drey’s stopped. 

“Pah! The day Ser Meryn Trant of the Kingsguard takes a lesson on swordplay from a dirty Dornishman-” 

“Like Prince Lewyn Martell or the Sword of the Morning.”

“One was killed by a boy-” Prince Lewyn was badly wounded before his duel with Ser Lyn Corbray. Aegon had learnt as much as he could over the years about the Battle of the Trident.

“A knight of Kingsguard killed by a boy.” Trant guffawed. “I have heard nothing so ridiculous. As for the other, a paltry party of northmen dispatched him. I have guarded His Grace since you were still in your swaddling clothes, _boy_. I would fight you with my right, while drinking with my left. Now move along for real knights to train.” 

“No.” Aegon turned away from him. 

“Egg, please.” Arianne rushed over to him, warning in her eyes. “Do not,” she whispered. “We are supposed to go unnoticed.” 

Meryn Trant unsheathed his sword, an ugly thing. “What did you say, _boy_?” 

Aegon took Drey’s sword from him. “I said, no.” He spun around to face him, raising his sword. “If you would have me move... make me.” 

The knight of the Kingsguard swaggered towards him haughtily. 

“First blood or to the death?” Aegon asked him.

“Who are you?”

“Aegon Sand-“

“Not only a Dornishman but a bastard.”

“...Natural son of Prince Oberyn Martell of Dorne.” That seemed to widen even this man’s droopy eyes. _Your reputation precedes you, uncle,_ he thought with a smile. 

“I will send you to your father in slices.”

“Not if I send you to yours.” And so Aegon began to dance with him in the way Ser Arthur taught him. He heard Ser Oswell’s laughter and saw Ser Gerold’s smile of pride in his mind’s eye. All else but the man in front of him disappeared. He was fighting against the usurper’s man. This was no battlefield but Aegon wanted to know the men around the usurper. And this one was not even fit to tie _his_ Kingsguard’s laces. Aegon’s blade sang through the air as he struck and spun and struck and spun, drawing back each time with another red stain. _Shallow cuts. But cuts nonetheless._ The brute had no more breath for insults, only enough for a paltry defence against Aegon’s strikes. He stumbled back each time and fell forward with every strike as Aegon struck and turned and hacked again, lunging, twisting, feinting, until he dropped the man and held the sword to his throat. 

“Do you yield to this dirty Dornishman, Ser?” 

The man made no move to speak so Aegon raised his sword. 

“I yield,” he squealed. 

It was then that Aegon heard a bellowing laugh and a ringing applause from a fat man with a crown. _Robert Baratheon._ All fell to their knees, all but Aegon and those behind the usurper. Facing his father’s enemy struck him like a gale that robbed him of breath. All of a sudden his brother’s words began to make sense. The giant...the _round_ giant in front of him looked nought like the man he had conjured up in his mind. Aegon had been told of a powerful bull of a man, all muscle and brawn. All that remained of the bull in this hog of a man was his height. The muscle made way for boundless fat that made him almost as round as an average man was tall. Behind the usurper stood Eddard Stark, the Lord of Winterfell, a golden haired boy, younger than Egg, and a man who so resembled him. He was clad in golden armour decorated with the Lannister lion. _Jaime Lannister._

“Excuse my cousin, Your Grace,” Arianne’s voice cut through. Her head was bowed. “He has never met a king.”

“Enough,” Robert Baratheon grunted. “Rise all of you. You, boy. Who are you?”

“I-“

“He’s my son.” Oberyn Martell swaggered in. Holding on to him, it seemed for life, was Elia Martell, all colour drained from her face. She looked at Aegon as if he was already dead. Septa Lemore clasped the chain around her neck, whispering to herself, no doubt in prayer. 

Robert looked at Egg and back at Oberyn. “The boy looks naught like you.”

“I have many children, all different and yet you would find a piece of me in each one. Aegon has my nose. Tyene over there has my eyes. Still,” he smirked, “I could say the same of you. Prince Joffrey,” he gestured at the scowling boy, “is as golden as the Lannister lion. I see no stag in him...and yet no one would doubt he is yours. Funny thing, children’s looks.” There was a cutting menace to Oberyn Martell’s smile. 

Meryn Trant stumbled up from bended knee long after everyone else stood. 

“I should take that cloak and hang it over the boy’s shoulders,” Robert Baratheon barked at him. “What say you to that, boy?” he added with a heavy laugh. 

“I do not have it in me to swear off women.”

That only beckoned a chesty laugh from the man whose teats bounced with every chuckle. “I like you boy. Why have I never seen you before?”

“He lives with his mother in Essos.” His mother spoke for the first time, still holding on to her brother for support. Robert Baratheon turned back to him, studying him hard and long. “How old are you boy?”

“Seven and ten…Your Grace.” Adding the courtesy burnt like bile through his throat. He was the usurper, and yet as Aegon looked at him he saw no true champion. Ned Stark looked the warrior he heard about and next to Jaime Lannister, Robert Baratheon was a slurring disappointment. Egg realised then the long haired man in black clothes who seemed to stare through him. 

“At your age I too wanted to fight and fuck and fight. You fight well, boy. Are you knighted?”

 _Yes by Ser Gerold Hightower himself._ “N-“

“Yes.” Oberyn Martell winked at him.

“Nothing gets you wenches like a knighthood,” he said before he staggered away. 

“Who taught you how to fight like that?” Jaime Lannister asked him.

“I learnt here and there. Why?”

“You reminded me of someone I knew.” The man who killed the Mad King, his grandfather, smiled wistfully. “You fight well.” He patted his shoulder and strode off. As he did so his mother ran up to him, pulling him away. “If you would see me dead, Aegon, there are easier ways to do so.” 

“I do not fear them.”

She stopped to stare at him. “Only a fool feels no fear. Fear is what will keep you alive not needless bravery. Now, follow me. Your uncle has come with news.” He saw the ghost of a smile pass through her lips. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This seems to be a constant these days but this chapter was supposed to be twice the length with too many things happening so I decided to split it in two (again for lack of time but also because I think it works better to separate it). There are three main beats next chapter: we find out what Oberyn knows and hints of what he’s been doing, Aegon learns a lesson on the northern way after the wedding and Jon’s parentage is discovered by *someone.* Dun dun dunnn… now do you see why I couldn’t fit it all in here (other than the fact that I’m snowed under with work lol)  
> I considered having a longer interaction between Robert & Egg and even going as far as Robert knighting him after he beats someone else but there’s a whole ceremony attached to knighthood so I settled for this short interaction.  
> I also considered Jaime asking him to train with him because he reminds him of himself but this is haughty book 1 Jaime, I suppose he could pay a limited compliment without going so far as to reduce himself to training with a bastard knight - though who knows? Also, I thought Elia might actually drop dead if she saw such a thing and I need her alive lol.  
> 3 more chapters in Winterfell before the story begins (I know what kind of story begins nearly 30 chapters in)?  
> I also think I found a way to plant Jonrya seeds despite their parting lol.


	24. Aegon

**Aegon**

Aegon stood as still as a plank for at least an hour as his uncle greeted lords and wooed northern ladies. All the while his brother’s wolf’s red eyes bore into him. With a tilted head the wolf watched him with eyes as discerning as the heart tree that discomfited him. Aegon moved away from the yard and attached himself to his uncle who was making his way inside the castle. The tan of Oberyn Martell’s skin, his pale red satin robe, jeweled belt and flowing sleeves made him stick out as he moved among the muted blues and browns of the northerners and the crimson that overwhelmed the usurper’s party. With the Lord of New Castle he discussed why a Dornish Red was superior to Arbor Gold and why he had brought caskets of the stuff for the wedding of the granddaughter of his greatest northern friend - “just don’t tell Stark and my good brother I said that,” he whispered conspiratorially. With the Glovers he spoke about the refurbishments to Deepwood Motte that transformed it from a wooden hall to a stone fortress. He presented gifts to the bride and groom, met each of the Stark direwolves, and carried around the youngest Stark on his shoulders while he spoke about trade with Lord Stark before he requisitioned him, raised eyebrow and all, with “And why is a Lannister’s whelp good enough for your daughter when a Martell is not.”

“A Baratheon and a prince,” Ned Stark corrected.

“Trystane is a prince too. Granted he will never be king…” 

“Sansa wanted the marriage. Arya was too young. I did not refuse.” 

“And now?” 

“And now she swears she will never marry.” 

“That I can understand,” his uncle laughed. “I tell all my daughters to seek pleasure wherever they can find it. Perhaps Arya will too.” Somehow Aegon did not think that pleased the frowning Stark lord. 

“It’s good to see you again, Aegon,” he said instead. “My sons seem to enjoy your company.”

“I did not think you would remember me, my lord.” Ned Stark had given him barely any attention when Egg had visited Deepwood Motte.

“I remember every face I meet and you kept my daughter company. I also know she convinced you to teach her how to fight. The two of you would sneak into the woods. As a father it is my duty to know what she does and who with. Given your skills, I can see why she’d want you as a teacher.” 

“Thank you, my lord,” Egg managed to say, unsure of how to respond. “She has gotten better.” 

Lord Stark simply smiled as he looked at her across the hall. For that moment, Egg wished his own father had lived to look at him with such love. But he was dead at the hands of Robert Baratheon. A man Ned Stark yet loved. As the Stark lord returned to his family, Aegon tried to push away thoughts of the day he may stand across the battlefield from the man who saved his mother and raised his brother. 

“What is this news?” he asked his mother impatiently on their way to the house in Winter Town.. 

For the first time since his arrival Mother smiled, truly smiled. “Not here,” she whispered. 

Oberyn Martell had arrived in the dead of the night with his small party and had been granted two houses among the neat rows log and undressed stone dwellings the Northerners retreated to during winter. Thin tendrils of smoke coiled away from the chimneys of the few inhabited homes. 

“No doubt Lady Sourface’s doing,” Oberyn Martell commented. “She cannot bear any more bastards under her roof. I will insist, of course, that my party of bastards sit beside me in my seat of honour at the wedding.” He laughed loudly as he said that. “For all I’ve done brokering trade between here and the Free Cities it’s the least I deserve.” Mother rolled her eyes and thwacked his arm even as she laughed with him. 

Though it was spring, the wooden stalls of the Winter Town market square were busy. Merchants peddled herbs and potions, perfumes and nuts, meats, cheeses fruits and spices. Oberyn bought something from each stall, laughing with each merchant. He even picked flowers for Lemore, making her laugh as they walked ahead of them. Every now and then he’d lean over and whisper something in her ear. She in turn would answer him with a saying from the Seven Pointed Star. His mother walked ahead of him, linking arms with Arianne and Tyene and laughing with them. And all the while, Aegon trailed behind them with Garin and Drey wondering what had so delighted his uncle and his mother. 

At the house he was introduced to Ellaria Sand, Oberyn’s paramour and mother to four of his daughters. With her was a knight with tussled hair introduced to him as Daemon Sand. It was clear that the two of them had been engaged in some...activity before their arrival. His uncle only seemed to smirk knowingly at the two of them, no doubt aware and approving. 

“I am pleased to finally meet you, Your Grace,” Daemon said on bended knee. 

“Is anyone going to tell us what’s going on?” Arianne demanded the moment greetings were exchanged and the family settled in the solar. 

“Patience, dear,” his uncle said, pouring them all glasses of wine. He handed the first glass to mother, the second to Lemore, then Aegon himself, followed by Arianne and Tyene. “First a toast.” 

“To what?” 

“To Aegon Targaryen Sixth of His Name, King of-”

“Uncle, please what is it?” Aegon finally asked, tired of the secrecy. “Where have you been?” 

“In Braavos.” He slurped his wine. “Lighting one of the sparks that will reduce Robert’s house of cards to ashes.” 

Aegon looked at a confused Arianne, then at his smiling mother and finally back to his grinning uncle. 

“Robert likes to believe the throne is his by right of conquest but if matters were that simple, Ned Stark or Tywin Lannister would have been king - they got to the Red Keep first. If not them, Jon Arryn could have staked a claim. After all, _he_ was the one who started the rebellion but the crown was given to Robert. Why? Because his grandmother was a Targaryen and with you and Rhaenys dead and Viserys in Essos well... he carried The Conqueror’s blood.” Oberyn took a swig of his wine. “And now...well, history will repeat itself. The throne is yours by right but even to those who fool themselves with Robert’s stories of conquest... if Robert and his heirs are dead, _you_ are next in line.”

No one said anything - his uncle was clearly enjoying drip-feeding them information. They simply awaited his next words. An uneasy feeling settled in Aegon’s stomach. He had seen the crown prince at the yard and saw his plump brother in passing - the murder of children would not make him any better than Tywin Lannister. 

“I will not have children killed.” 

“You will not have to. Those Hills in the castle have no claim to the Iron Throne.” He swirled the wine in his glass before he looked up at his sister, “Or would they be Waters?” 

“What?” 

“Jaime is the father of Cersei’s children,” Mother explained. 

Arianne and Lemore gasped. Tyene looked stunned but said nothing. Too shocked to reply, Egg could only stare dumbly between the two of them. “What?” Feeling a hypocrite for his own grandparents were siblings and his own father had intended to marry him to his sisters, Aegon stated the obvious. “They are brother and sister.”

Oberyn Martell emptied his glass and then rose to pour himself some more wine, amusement etched across his face.

“Did they kill Jon Arryn for that reason?” 

“I didn’t know _he_ was dead until I came here but I wouldn’t be surprised. He had been looking into the matter with Stannis Baratheon. According to your mother’s Spider-” 

“He is not _my_ Spider.” 

“You should be proud to call him yours. I’ve never met a person who can so change themselves _without_ being a faceless man. One day he’s a begging brother, the next a stout guard, another day he is a true, albeit fat, beauty with a moon-shaped face and dark curls who I might have f-” 

“Oberyn.” 

“What?” He turned around to face her. Pointing at Arianne and Aegon he said, “You think _they_ aren’t fucking? I know _this_ one,” he waved a finger at Tyene “is fucking Drey Dalt.” 

Lemore pursed her lips. Both Arianne and Tyene were unperturbed. They had spent their whole lives with the man. Aegon had not and he was in front of his mother. If he could will the ground to swallow him up he would. Unable to meet his mother’s eyes, he cleared his throat. “Even if the children are not Robert’s he is hale enough to father legitimate children. It would only take Stannis’ word to bring down the Lannisters.” 

His uncle scoffed. “There is no love lost between the two of them. If Stannis thought Robert would believe him he would have no need to turn to Jon Arryn. Without evidence he is only a greedy uncle usurping his nephews. Without Jon Arryn, Stannis’ best hope is Ned Stark, a man Robert loves more than him.”

“Lord Stark would champion him.” 

“Not if Stannis is dead.”

“How will you reach him?” Mother asked, sounding unsure for the first time. “Stannis has now retired to Dragonstone. No doubt his flight is linked to Jon Arryn’s. He could bide his time there until he was ready to resurface far from our reach and the Lannisters’.” 

“ _Valar Morghulis,_ dear sister.” Oberyn grinned and raised his glass to her. “He _will_ die. It is a good thing for us really that he is not in King’s Landing. It would not do for him to tell Ned Stark of this until we are ready. Stannis will die, there is no doubt about it.” He shook a finger between them all. “ _We_ must be ready to strike when he does, for Robert is not long in this world - Cersei cannot stand his philandering and The Spider has already laid his eggs in Renly’s ear. He, his lover and the Fat Flower are lining up Margaery Tyrell to take Cersei’s place. The moment Robert plants a child in her womb, Renly will expose the truth of Cersei’s children. He cannot risk doing so before then for that would make Stannis Robert’s heir and neither Renly nor the Tyrells would sniff power for at least a thousand generations. I have never met a more begrudging man than Stannis Baratheon - he has not forgotten their feasts as he starved nor Robert’s gift of Storm’s End to his brother. The moment Stannis dies, _we_ will be the ones to expose the truth.” 

“What of Renly.” 

“Cersei will do us the favour of killing him. Her hands should be a little dirty after all and the little deer is beloved to many. With the Baratheon brothers dead in quick succession, there will be credence to the claim that Cersei’s children are bastards for if they were not she would not have the Baratheon brothers and Lord Arryn killed in... _questionable_ circumstances.” Oberyn grinned widely. “When Lord Stark makes the discovery, we will ask for a council to be called.”  
“Uncle,” Arianne said. “Have you forgotten Stannis has a daughter?”

Oberyn waved his hand in dismissal. “A shy, quiet thing. To the lords of Westeros, cocks matter.” 

“Not so in the Dance of the Dragons.” 

“She doesn’t _have_ to live,” Tyene informed them all. “It would be a mercy for the poor thing. We travelled through the old cities of the Rhoynar. The curse of grey-scale is such a sad, sad thing.” 

“She would be no threat if she bent the knee.”

“Her children-”

“Doran would marry her to Trystane,” Oberyn said. “A Martell would be Lord of Storm’s End, and your child might marry theirs uniting Targaryen and Baratheon for good. What matters is we get to her before her mother tries to crown her.”

Aegon had always known his path to the throne would be paved with bodies, yet the prior knowledge did little to quell the guilt he felt. As if she could read him, his mother leaned over to him. “Everything they have they gained because of your convenient death. They would not hesitate to remove you from their way, Egg. We will not either.”

“Your mother says you plan to contract The Golden Company.”

“Yes.”

“Good, perhaps Jon Connington will cease being so bitter if he has men under his command. We must all leave soon. Doran will be readying the spears by now, I must return to report to him and well, you have an army to gather.”

When they were finally alone, Mother embraced him properly. “Your time is nigh,” she said tearfully, “I will die happy once I see you on your throne.” A few streaks of grey lined her once raven black hair but she was as beautiful as ever. Elia Martell was three-and-forty now. Twenty years after she married Rhaegar Targaryen, Aegon hoped to return her to her rightful place in the centre of power. The wrongs of the past would finally be righted. 

“You will have many more years, Mother. My children will need their grandmother and I will need you. We will finally be free to be mother and son. We have so much time to make up for.”

That made her sob a laugh. “I have lived only for that.” 

Egg kissed her forehead. 

“You are happy with Arianne,” she mumbled against his chest. 

“Yes.” The word slipped forth easily. He was, had been - for the first time since Viserys’ death.

“Good.” She looked up to him, still within his arms. “Always remember, she is my niece.” _Do not do to her what your father did to me,_ went unsaid. 

“I would never hurt her.”

She gave him a grateful smile.

“Jon will be joining you.”

“Yes. The boy had the silly idea to join the Night’s Watch.”

“What?” Egg moved back in shock.

“Catelyn Stark’s doing no doubt. The boy is tight-lipped but I do not doubt that she made him believe he would have no place in Winterfell after Ned left. Thankfully, his uncle had plans for him but he is not yet ready to populate The Gift. Jon will stay with me until Ned’s return.”

“His return?”

“Ned holds no love for the south after everything it’s taken from him. He means to find out what happened to Jon Arryn and then return.”

“What if the Lannisters harm him? He is our only chance.”

“We won’t let them.” Her voice was iron. “Now, you will need to move your things here, Egg-“

“But-“

“You have already attracted too much attention to yourself. I nearly dropped dead of fright when I saw you speaking to that man.” She took his face into her hands. “Aegon, that man will not hesitate to kill you. Stay far away from him, that wife of his and Jaime most of all - he knew your father best of them all.”

It was late afternoon when he returned to Winterfell to collect his things. Sers Drey Dalt and Daemon Sand accompanied him on Mother’s orders. Knights and other retainers duelled against one another. He saw his brother stand where others tilted at the quintain and went to join him.

“Robb is the North’s best lance,” Jon told him. 

“He wins every year,” Bran added. “I might win if they let me take part. It’s not fair. Ser Barristan was already called _The Bold_ at ten. I am _two-and-ten_ and they won’t let me tilt against a bloody quintain while ‘ _greater’_ warriors are here. When I’m Ser Barristan’s squire then they will see.” The tirade had turned Bran Stark’s face red. His wolf moved to nuzzle against him as if he had sensed his master’s annoyance and sought to soothe it. 

“Is he a hero of yours?”

“One of them and the greatest knight alive,” he said wondrously. “Father says I might squire for him. I’m going to be a knight of the Kingsguard one day like Ser Gerold Dayne, The White Bull, Ser Oswell Whent, my mother’s cousin, and Ser Arthur Dayne, The Sword of the Morning. Father says he was the best swordsman he has ever seen.” Aegon could only grin. _He is and soon, he will return home._

“Why don’t you take part?” he asked his brother. 

Jon’s look of amusement faded. “Bastards have no place in lordly games.” 

“War cares not for lords or bastards, only skill. It does them no good to pretend status matters more than that when they play these games.”

Jon only smiled while _his_ wolf stared silently at Aegon until his own smile disappeared. Something about the white wolf discomfited him. 

“I came to get my things,” he began. “My u- father has been granted two houses in Winter Town for his stay so I’ll be out of your hair.”

“It’s no trouble. We enjoyed your company. Will the princess and Tyene be joining you?”

“Yes.”

“That’s a shame. Arya will miss them.”

“Why?”

“She likes their company...Her bedmates are not the best of friends with her.”

“The two of you are close.” Aegon remembered them all as children, Arya was never far from him. The four of them had once stood at this very yard, Aegon with Arya as Robb and Jon sparred. _‘Mother says you can never be Lord of Winterfell,”_ Robb reminded him when Jon won the spar. His brother's face had crumbled and he ran away. It was the three year old Arya who went to comfort him when Egg’s own words fell on deaf ears. 

“I was three when she was born,” Jon smiled. “I have never known life without her there. She...she has never let me feel alone. The two of us have always been the misfits. Robb would be Lord of Winterfell. Sansa will now be queen-“

 _She will not,_ Egg thought as Arianne walked over to him. 

“Arya and I have never had such bright hopes for a future.”

“I don’t know about that,” Arianne rejoined, weaving her fingers through Egg’s. “You are now Lord of The Gift. Your future is as bright as gold and so is Arya’s. She may find herself a golden knight in the south.”

“No, I won’t.” Aegon would learn during this trip just why she was named Underfoot. “I will grow old here...where I belong.” 

“You will marry. Perhaps it will be that lordling there.” Arianne pointed out a young man who was looking over at them as he sharpened his sword. His armour sported a black battle-axe. “Or perhaps it will be that one.” This time she pointed out a young lord whose cloak was broached with a white sun. She moved a strand of Arya’s hair behind her ear. “You have grown into a beauty little one, men will fall over each other for-“

“And you will marry Aegon, is that it?” She signalled at their joined hands with her eyes, clearly finding the attention uncomfortable. 

“Perhaps,” Arianne grinned in response. “We would make beautiful children don’t you think?”

Jon looked at him, mouth agape. “The two of you-“

“Why the surprise, Jon? Kissing cousins are not so rare. _Some_ even choose their siblings.” Arianne wiggled her eyebrows with the mirth of new found knowledge. 

“But-“

“I’m a bastard,” Aegon confirmed for him.

“And I care not.”

“Wouldn’t your father? You are his heir!” 

“Perhaps I’d give up Sunspear for my love.” She looked up at him with such adoration, Aegon felt consumed by the burgeoning tendrils that unfurled from his heart. Her lips curled into a pleased smile.She gazed so lovingly at him Egg could swear his heart was about to burst from the love he felt for her

Arya gasped and ducked suddenly. “You haven’t seen me,” she sniped as she began to sneak away. He followed her line of sight to see Lady Stark and what must have been Sansa walking in their direction. The two of them looked so alike with their high cheekbones, piercing blue eyes and auburn hair. Among the brown-haired northerners the two of them stood out. The golden-haired woman with them, Aegon realised, was Cersei Lannister herself. The lion on her dress all but screamed _Hear me roar._ If Naerys was half as beautiful as this woman, Aegon Targaryen understood why The Dragonknight might have loved her. Cersei Lannister cut a graceful figure between her companions. As they got closer, Aegon noted that beside the usurper’s queen, Lady Stark’s stance was proper even if tense. Sansa Stark smiled as if she owned the world, and Cersei...the woman who cuckolded a king for her brother, looked utterly contemptuous of her surroundings. Naerys Targaryen on all accounts was a good woman married to a bad man. She made friends with her own husband’s mistress, was charitable and cared little for jewels and finery. The woman who glided past him as if he were invisible, had jewels in her hair, across her neck, in her ears and the fine rings on her fingers glinted in the sun - finery that only added to her beauty. The Lannister woman was striking. It was difficult in that moment for him to imagine this outwardly beautiful woman had two of her husband’s bastards killed and the mother sold into slavery. She was no Naerys after all which made it even harder for Egg to understand just how Jaime Lannister had fallen for his - on all accounts so far - callous, contemptuous and conniving sister. The ignominy his own Kingsguard held for the golden knight came unbidden to him then. ‘ _I would expect little else from an oathbreaker,’_ he imagined Ser Oswell say. What he knew of Ser Jaime Lannister now was hard to reconcile with the image his mother had painted previously of a young boy seeking honour and glory whose life was changed evermore by the act of killing a mad king. _Would a man who sought honour take his king’s wife for a lover? Would he father not one but three children with her and see good men die to keep their secret?_

Arianne squeezed his hand, breaking him off from his reverie. “I for one cannot wait to have a room to ourselves again,” she announced for the two of them to hear. He did not think his little brother’s face could get redder. “I told you,” she laughed as they walked to collect his things, “He’s even worse with girls than you.”

Robb Stark married his Manderly bride in front of Winterfell’s heart tree the following evening. Jon had told him that the bride was a follower of the Seven but with a Southron mother of his own, Catelyn Stark was keen for her son’s wedding to take place in the godswood to remind the North that he was as Stark as his predecessors, even if he looked more like her than his father. Though that was true, Robb stood exactly like Lord Eddard Stark, wearing the same colours. Egg himself had worn the colours of Sunspear but chose to couple the red of the Martell sun with black woolen breeches. The colours of the dragon. To soothe his mother he wore an orange cloak.

Though most stood, Cersei Lannister and the usurper sat. She dazzled in crimson samite, glowering dispassionately at the proceedings. The usurper already seemed drunk though that did little to prevent him from emptying his wineskin during the short northern ceremony. His eyes were bloodshot, but their blue was cold, dead, flat as if his soul was already wallowing in the seven hells. Though such an image may have inspired pity in him had he seen it in anyone else, it only invoked revulsion in him. This was the man who, not content with killing his father, had accused his mother of killing her own children and laughed at her loss. He contemplated killing him there and then, for his father, for his mother and Rhaenys, the sister who had been hiding with her cat. Feeling tears spring up in his eyes, Aegon looked away from the usurper. There was nothing he could for his family now. Acting on his urges would lead to his death and then he would never get the opportunity to take the life of the man who orchestrated what befell Mother. Aegon lived to become king but only so he could evoke his revenge on the man named the Lord of Lannister. Behind the two of them stood Robert’s Kingsguard. Meryn Trant sported a scabbing scar across his cheek. He grimaced at Egg from where he stood. The second was short. Whatever he might have looked like when he had donned the white cloak, he had since gone to fat like a poorly exercised horse. From the black porcupines on his armour, he was a Blount of the Crownlands. Egg had taken to trying to identify each noble he met from their insignia. Haldon had spent years teaching him the names, sigils and castles of each noble house in the Seven Kingdoms. _A king should know his people._ Jaime Lannister glimmered in his golden armour. Aegon looked between him and his sister trying to see if their affair was obvious to an onlooker. He could not see any evidence other than the three golden-haired, green eyed children. A split surcoat of the crowned stag of Baratheon and the golden lion of Lannister decorated the velvet tunic of Joffrey Waters, though Arianne insisted he was a Hill. He watched the events with the same disdain on his mother’s face. His eyes met Egg’s more than once, each time his lips curled in a sneer. Beside him was his brother, a plump boy on all accounts but one engrossed in the proceedings. He had a bright smile and must have been of an age with Bran Stark. Next to him was his sister, a pretty girl, Egg thought though she whispered incessantly with her imp uncle. The leering man was quite the spectacle. Given all he’d learnt recently, however, Egg did not find him to be a source of more than passing interest. The woman who had once hoped to marry his father and married his killer, the man who killed his grandfather and the usurper were the only people he could not take his eyes off. Soon, they would either be dead or deposed. It was what he would do with Jaime Lannister that he questioned most. He was an oathbreaker twice over. Aegon might have excused him for his grandfather’s killing as a means of showing that he recognised the Mad King’s horrors but the golden knight had fathered the three children in front of him despite foreswearing reproduction. He was thinking of Ser Lucamore Strong when the crowd broke out in cheers at the end of the ceremony. Beside the groom, Robb’s wolf howled a call answered by his pack, one was next to each Stark child and his brother. His mother had insisted Jon stand with her when Lady Stark moved him to a forgotten corner of the godswood. “You are now a member of the Glover household,” she said, taking his arm to stand beside her husband and brother. _How curious,_ Aegon thought as they sat on a hightable in Winterfell’s Great Hall. _The usurper sits across from two of Rhaegar’s sons, completely unaware._ The highest table on the dais was reserved for the bride and groom, the king and queen, their children and an assortment of serving women who would find themselves on Robert’s lap without fail whenever they appeared with more wine or food. Aegon watched him with disgust. This was the man who had painted his father as a rapist. And here he was groping and grabbing woman after woman and no one batted an eye. No one but his wife who held her own glass with a white-knuckle hold and Ser Jaime whose jaw was tense. _Is this what pushed him to take his sister for a paramour?_

At a lower table but higher from all others sat the Starks and the Manderlys and across from them sat Prince Oberyn, Arianne, his mother and their family. As a prince and the heir of a Great House Arianne and Oberyn were granted a seat of honour. True to his word, Oberyn insisted on sitting with his family - most of whom were bastards. Aegon learnt then that many of the ladies in attendance had taken great offence at a bastard paramour being given a place on the dais but no one had the gall to speak of that. Aegon was just happy to see his brother beside him, even if he’d look forlornly at where the only family he knew sat. _I’m here,_ Aegon wanted to say. He wondered whether his brother might come to care for him when the news was finally revealed. He had spent so long wanting a brother. Viserys came so close in that last year of his life. As he ate, he looked across to his mother and Arianne who whispered with one another as they laughed. She had gifted Arianne a diamond necklace that morning, one his grandmother Rhaella had gifted her on the day of her betrothal. The placement of the candles and torches in the room, highlighted the spark of the jewels across her neck. Tyene’s golden curls complemented the green gown she wore. From where she sat she looked a most innocent maid and not at all like a woman who could kill everyone in that hall with a few drops of liquid. Ellaria Sand, curiously enough, was in deep conversation with Septa Lemore. 

Near the dais a singer serenaded the couple and was replaced by jesters aiming crude jokes at the newly weds, eliciting blushes from maids and hollers from the lords. Following the end of the feast, pages began to move the tables to allow for dancing. 

“Before the dancing, I have an announcement to make,” the usurper slurred loudly after a banging shattered the buzz of laughter and chatter in Winterfell’s Great Hall. “First,” he raised his chalice “I wish to congratulate our newlyweds who will be having more fun than anyone else here, bar those who will be swiving in the stables, of course.” He spilled wine on himself as he laughed. Lady Stark looked at her husband questioningly. Ned Stark looked a man embattled. Not for the first time since his arrival, Egg wondered what tied him to the man. 

“But we have more than one cause for celebration this night. Ned and I also wish to right a wrong.” Mother grabbed his hand under the table. “I mean to join Baratheon and Stark as was intended before I drove my hammer through the black heart of the thrice-damned despoiler who stole and raped my Lyanna.” The words were a knife twisted through his gut. He hadn’t noticed how hard he was squeezing his mother’s hand until she gently placed her other hand over his. “Breathe,” she whispered. Across from him he saw Benjen Stark get up to leave. The younger Stark had known of and kept his sister’s relationship with Rhaegar secret. Arthur and Os often spoke of him with fond memory. He was said to have loved Lyanna most. He clearly could not bear to listen to the usurper’s word any more than Egg. Egg tried to do the same but his mother pulled him back down.

“I meant to finally join our two noble houses with the betrothal of my son, Joffrey, and Sansa of House Stark now that there are no more dragonspawn left to threaten their union.” At that, the urge to laugh needled it’s way through the wildfire that raged in his veins. The rest of whatever the usurper had said was drowned out by the ringing in his ears. The moment the dancing began, he huried out of the hall and out into the night - a welcome cool and quiet after the clatter inside. Several people shared the small courtyard outside which held a small sept, Egg walked on. As the usurper predicted, distinct sounds came out of the stables and from the many corners in the courtyard of the inner castle. Aimlessly he continued, under a covered bridge and past the empty armoury. He had two options, turn left into the godswood with the haunting tree and gnarled face or right to two old uninhabited towers. Egg chose the latter option, such was his desire to be alone. 

The moon was an enormous silver ball hanging against the sky. Aegon sat beside a mountain of hay outside the tower. He wondered whether his Kingsguard had made it to Pentos now and imagined Jon Connnington’s look of triumph at Aegon’s decision to sail home with The Golden Company. The Griffin Lord had once been a commander of the illustrious company, giving his position up and being known as a thief and drunk. He would relish their return more than most in his company of ghosts. 

“Aegon! There you are!” He hadn’t realised his mother had hurried out after him. “I know it’s hard,” she added with a pant when she neared him. She opened her arms out to embrace him. “But he will be dead soon. By our hands or his wife’s, he will be gone and every wrong done to us will be paid for. That is my vow to you.” 

“If Cersei kills him, he is not paying.” 

“What difference does it make? He will be dead.” She took his face into her hands. “Robert is a coward who sees himself as a hero. I care not how he dies. Tywin Lannister is the man whose eyes I will look into as he dies. He is the one who made this man king over the bones of my children.”

“It’s not fair, Mother” he agonised. “The usurper defiles my father and talks of Lyanna as if she cared for him.” Arthur and Os always said she held him with disdain. “And everyone here buys his story.” 

“That is not new knowledge, dear. You have heard these words before. It doesn’t make them true.” 

“But I didn’t hear it from the man who killed my father, the man Lyanna ran away to avoid. He gets to live his life pretending to be the aggrieved party all while drinking and grabbing every serving woman in front of his subjects and it’s my father who is the raper!” 

Mother looked all around them and pulled him down. “Keep your voice down,” she muttered. Her voice was little more than a whisper, hard to catch over the rustling of leaves. Aegon’s blood ran cold, sure that they’d been overheard but it was only the wolves. His brother’s and another. The rest looked so alike but for Jon’s and the youngest’s who had black fur. The grey wolf nestled in the hay, completely uninterested in him but his brother’s wolf stalked its way over to them, red eyes bearing into him. Aegon extended a shaky hand out to placate the wolf. It sniffed his fingers before licking his hand before laying his head on Egg’s lap. 

“Do you think he knows I’m his master’s brother, Mother?” Egg asked. 

She only laughed at him and scratched the white wolf between its ears. Aegon told himself it recognised him. 

Three days later on a red dawn, the day before he left Winterfell, Egg joined his mother’s husband and his uncle. A northern lord’s bastard and his accomplice were to be executed for the rapes and killings of his father’s servant girls. Jon had hunted them down and captured them himself. The previous night Robert had found the two guilty, announcing that the sentence would be carried out at daybreak. The bastard made the journey on the back of a grey horse led by his own father. The previous night, the Lord of the Dreadfort had decried him dispassionately as if the man had been a fly he’d crushed underfoot and not his son. “Tainted blood is ever treacherous,” he said. “I would count myself and my lands well to be rid of him. Any trueborn sons I may have would never have been safe while he lives.” Jon had visibly bristled when the man had made his comment. Now, Lord Bolton rode ahead of his condemned son with cold indifference. 

“This is wrong,” Robb said as they rode to the hill where the execution would take place. Ethan Glover rode ahead with Eddard Stark and Egg with Jon, Robb, Bran and Theon Greyjoy. 

“What is?” The man’s guilt had seemed clear enough for Egg. 

“The king should be the one doing this.” The young Bran Stark explained before Jon taught Egg a northern belief he hadn’t heard before. “The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. Father always says a ruler who hides behind paid executioners soon forgets what death is. The king this morning did not see this as a matter to bestir himself for.” Atop the hill the executioner's block was ready. The condemned men dismounted. The servant knelt first beside the block. Lord Stark asked him for his last words before he announced the sentence and the deep rippled Stark ancestral Valyrian steel sword came down on his head. When the bastards time came he only laughed with menace right until the sword separated his head from his neck. His laughter echoed across the hills even after his death. 

The Bolton lord was given their bodies. “Let the wolves have them, my lord,” he said with indifference as he climbed back atop his horse. 

“Aegon,” Arya called out from Winterfell’s walls as he rode away with his uncle and Lord Glover away from the castle and to Winter Town. 

“Come with me,” she said when he handed his horse to a groom. Her wolf was beside her. 

“Where?”

“The broken tower. My father will be in the godswood.”

“Why?”

“It’s the only place no one goes.” 

“Shouldn’t we pick up some swords?” he asked her as they sped past the yard. 

“We won’t need them.” She walked ahead of him and he had no choice but to follow her. They continued in silence and Egg wondered just what she planned to do. Enough women had made advances on him through out his life but he could normally tell when a woman had improper intentions with him. He read it in the fluttered brows and the flirtatious smiles. Arya Stark did not even look at his face since they began this march to the quiet part of the castle. 

“Where is everyone?” he asked. 

“The king rode out with his men and guests have already started returning home.”

He noticed Bran climbing up the side of the tower he’d sat underneath the night before. 

“Is it safe for him to be doing that?”

“Bran never falls.”

Arya settled underneath a flowering oak tree and Egg sat beside her, a little disquieted by the silence. “Nymeria, guard,” she ordered the grey wolf ever so softly. Amber eyes stared back at her before the wolf followed her command. 

“You’ve trained her well.” Egg bit into his apple. 

“She’s always understood me. Old Nan says we were meant to have these wolves. Sometimes…” she shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. You’re leaving tomorrow.”

“Yes.”

“Where will you go?”

“Back to my mother in Essos.”

“Not Deepwood Motte?” She turned to look at him square in his eyes. “You are Aegon Targaryen, son of Rhaegar and Elia Martell. I don’t know how you’re alive or why you are hiding but you are not Prince Oberyn’s son.” 

The cold fingers of dread crawled up his skin. “Arya. Wha-don’t be ridiculous. I am Aegon, son Oberyn Martell and-“

“You dye your hair blue because it would otherwise be silver. Your eyes look blue but when someone looks closely they are purple. I have never met a Targaryen but Septa Mordane has harped on about Aemon The Dragonknight and Queen Naerys more times than I care to count.” She put on a high pitched voice. “ _Queen Naerys was slender and small, with big purple eyes and fine, pale, porcelain skin and the silver hair of the Targaryens._ You dye your hair blue to hide your silver hair not because you’re from Tyrosh.”

“My mother was from Volantis. There are many of us with silver hair and people do dye their hair in Tyrosh. Don’t be ridiculous Arya,” he stammered. “Everyone knows Prince Aegon is dead.” He got up to leave, throwing the rest of the apple away. “I must leave.”

He realised then as her wolf snarled at him, teeth bared, body stiff that it was there to prevent his leaving not to guard against anyone else. This part of the castle was the quietest. 

From where she sat, Arya reminded him of words he said to his mother in the presence of no one else but the...wolves. Words that stopped him cold in his tracks. “You called Princess Elia your mother on the night of the wedding. You said the king was your father’s killer...you said Jon was your brother.” She walked over to him and took his hand in hers. “Was Princess Elia my father’s lover? Is that why Father is letting him live with her?”

“What?” Egg realised she cared not for who he was at all but Jon. Suddenly he remembered that even at three she had wanted to know who Jon’s mother was. “Arya I am-“ He couldn’t deny her words. “How do you know I said those things? No one was there?”

She gazed at him, almost unseeing, before she looked away. “It’s...hard to explain. You are supposed to be dead. What happened?”

“How do you know? You can’t just expect answers. Why were you snooping?”

She bit her lip and flared, “I wasn’t!”

“No? You were just hanging about an abandoned tower during your own brother’s wedding?”

“I wasn’t here!”

“No?” Dread locked up tight in his stomach. _Who else knows?_

“It...it wasn’t me who heard you. It was Nymeria.” She pointed at her wolf. 

“What?” He sounded incredulous even to his own ears. 

“I...can’t explain it.” She wrung her fingers. “Sometimes I...dream I am Nymeria and I run in her skin with Ghost and Greywind, Shaggy and Lady and Summer. But on the night of the wedding I was in the hall but I was Nymeria as well and...I heard you.” 

“Have you told anyone else?”

“No.”

“Does Jon have this...gift?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so. He would have told me.”

“Have you told him?”

She bit her lip. “No...not yet. I sound crazy even when I think about it. I’ve never even said it aloud before now.”

“Why did you wait this long to speak to me?”

“You were always with someone else. Why _are_ you pretending to be someone else? Everyone thinks you’re dead.”

“Because if I was alive they would kill me again.” And so that day, underneath an oak tree in Winterfell, Aegon Targaryen son of Rhaegar told the niece of Lyanna Stark his story, unsure at every juncture why he did. Above them, the oak’s branches swayed in the wind showering them with leaves and flowers. In the sky grey clouds crowded together as if they too would tear along with him. Bran was atop the tower he learnt was called the First Keep. He jumped around its roof surrounded by crows. 

“When Robert Baratheon was presented with the body of my sister and the baby they thought was me, he laughed. Even though my mother was in the room, he laughed and called my sister and I _dragonspawn.”_ Bitter bile crept up his throat. “I cannot be Aegon Targaryen in a world ruled by that man. Because of him, this is only the fourth time I have ever spent time with my mother. If he found out I was alive, he would have me killed and this time, I do not think even your father could save my mother.”

“I-I...My...my father would not be friends with such a man,” she said sharply. “That can’t be true.”

“Lord Stark left King’s Landing the next day, angry with the man who had been his friend. It was your aunt’s death and the Greyjoy rebellion that reconciled them.”

“Is that when...my father and Princess Elia…”

“No my mother and your father have never been lovers. Jon’s mother was already with child when they met.” 

“Then how is he your brother?”

“Because he’s not yours. He is my father’s son.”

She let out a disbelieving laugh filled with acridity. “That’s not funny! I told you the truth. Why-“ She punched him in the chest. 

He grabbed her hands. “I’m not lying. I swear it.”

“You are. You’re a liar and a charlatan and-“

“I’m not lying, Arya! I swear it. He is not your father’s son.”

“Why would my father raise a Targaryen, stupid? Jon-“

“Because he is his sister’s son. After what befell Rhaenys and the child my mother held that day, it was Lady Lyanna’s dying wish that her brother save her child from Robert Baratheon.”

Arya snatched her hands out from within his. Her face was ashen as if his words had drained her of her life’s blood. “I-“ she stuttered. “You’re lying. You’re- if that was true Princess Elia should hate Jon and she loves him. You’re a liar. You’re a stupid liar.” She hit him again. Once square in his jaw and then in his chest until he had to restrain her again. 

So he began to relate the events of Harrenhal and beyond to her. “My mother was there when your aunt died. She was the one who has taken your father to the tower my father built to protect her from his father, the Mad King, and from Robert as well. When Lady Lyanna died, my mother held Jon in her arms and promised to love him in place of his dead parents.” Egg smiled sadly. “She didn’t know then whether I was alive or dead. She was a childless mother and Jon was an orphan. They cured each other’s hurts.”

A tear coursed down Arya’s cheek. Egg wondered whether he imagined a softening in her mouth because her eyes glowered at him with an unmistakable hardness. Even so, she didn’t speak so Aegon continued. “My father didn’t seize Lady Lyanna. She ran away with him because she did not want to marry Robert Baratheon. She married my father instead.” Aegon told it all. He told her how the Kingsguard protected Lyanna from both Aerys and Robert, the oaths Lord Stark’s men swore to take the truth of Jon’s status as a Targaryen secret and how his mother convinced Ned Stark to let the Kingsguard leave so that they could find him. He explained why she hadn’t told Ned that Egg was alive since she herself had been unsure and grieving for a child she thought lost. 

“If what you’re saying is true, my father would have told my mother and she wouldn’t hate Jon!”

“Your father and my mother can never tell the truth to anyone. They would risk us if they did. It is treason to lie to a king. They’d both lose their heads for that. Lord Glover does not know who I truly am either.”

Crying Arya whispered, “My father...why would my father agree to be the king’s Hand if he would kill him?”

Despite all he’d shared with her, Egg wasn’t sure it was his place to speak of the Lannisters’ involvement in Jon Arryn’s death. “I don’t know,” he answered instead. 

“We have to tell Jon.”

“He can’t!” Egg gripped her hands tight again. “We can’t tell him…” _Your father will know I’m alive._ “So long as Robert Baratheon lives, he will never be safe.”

“He won’t tell anyone. I’ll make him swear to keep it secret.”

“Arya…” he sighed wearily, throat dry with regret. _Why did I tell her anything?_ Egg had placed his life in the hands of the girl in front of him. He realised with anguish that there was every chance he would be dead before day’s end. It was his mother he worried for most. He felt like a juggler balancing balls. The slightest miscalculation in his next words could bring both their worlds crashing down. “If it was safe for Jon to know, your father would have told him. He knows what Robert Baratheon is capable of most. You have to promise me. This is the only way we can keep Jon safe.”

Arya shifted where she sat and bit her lip. “I prom-“ she began to say when they heard a scream. Aegon looked up to see Bran Stark fall from the First Keep. Arya sprang up and ran to him, with Aegon at her heels. His fall was cushioned by the small mountain of hay that lined the wall of the keep. Relief flooded Aegon’s body when Bran stood up to dust the straw from his clothes. Their eyes had just met. Arya shouted “You stupid!” at him. Bran opened his mouth to speak when a blackened stone struck him in the head. Egg looked up to see where it fell from and thought he saw a shadow move. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Martells don’t know about Littlefinger being behind Jon Arryn’s murder so to them, given Ned’s suspicions about the Lannisters, the Lannisters totally killed him. I know what you’re thinking... planning for a council? What could go wrong? I’ll admit it’s a little naive. They haven’t accounted for a creepy man whose name begins with P and whose favourite colour is auburn lmaoo. I think they realise it won’t be easy as they hope hence the readying of their armies.
> 
> Everyone else @ the Twincest: how disgusting. The Targaryen in Egg: I’d get it if she was good but how can you love a cow?
> 
> Oberyn @ the wedding: “The Baratheon dynasty is dead and you don’t even know it. Let me just sip this wine I paid for and enjoy your fall in real time.” 
> 
> I know our Renly chapter was ages ago now but did our Spider convince Renly to replace Cersei with Marg only to give himself ammunition to convince Cersei to kill Renly? Remember kids, everyone in King’s Landing is a fly in the Spider’s web lmao.
> 
> Ghost was giving Egg #Bran in season 8 episode one vibes with the silent stares.
> 
> In an early, early outline I considered writing a Ramsay chapter with the fall of Winterfell written from his POV. He ended up killing Bran and Rickon for true. I obviously couldn’t bring myself to kill my boys Rickon and Bran - if you’ve read my previous work you’ll know I love these two babies. So I decided that it’s fine to want good things for good people. His death could instead be a lesson for Aegon.
> 
> In this universe, Bran named his wolf and (at least) Arya’s warging ability has started early.
> 
> Arya-equal-opportunity-beatings-Stark doesn’t care whether a prince is a Targaryen or a Baratheon lol. 
> 
> I’ve been mentioning the haystacks near the First Keep for a while now lol. I didn’t want Bran to lose his legs. There are no Others this time round so you know Bran has to find another place in the world. I had to google traumatic brain injuries and whether they may lead to a coma so that’s what we’re going for. In a world with wargs and direwolves we can accept a gargoyle to the head okay? Thanks. 
> 
> Will fix typos in the morning :)


	25. Arya

**Arya**

Bran lay sick, eyes open and unseeing for nearly a fortnight. Arya had stayed by his side, leaving only for the garderobe, and for her bed at the end of the day. Her mother had not done even that. She had a hard bed brought in, took her meals in Bran’s room and seldom spoke. It was as if Bran was both there and not. At times he’d seem awake, his eyes would be open, sometimes they’d even wander. At other times they’d shut, and he would look as if he were only sleeping. Those times were when Arya lived on a knife-edge, hopeful that he’d wake in the morning and that they would joke, and laugh, and fight. Then morning would come and it would be more of the same. Other times, she’d dread the hours when he closed his eyes, fearful that he might slip away when she wasn’t there. In the mornings, when she returned even with the despair there’d be a coolness wash over her heart when she saw his eyes open. He was still there. There was still hope. Maester Luwin said that the haystack outside the First Keep had saved his life and his legs. Arya could not imagine him losing the ability to walk. Bran would be a knight one day. As for the injury to his head, Maester Luwin said they had no choice but to wait. There was every chance that Bran may never wake up. He would. Arya knew he would. His wolf was waiting for him. All the wolves were. They cried out together. It was as if their howls were calling him back.When she was in Nymeria’s skin, a still new development she couldn’t control, she too joined them and wondered whether Bran was in his wolf as well. Arya had not yet spoken to anyone about this other than Aegon. He had been so troubled by what she learnt that he had not ridiculed her or called her a monster for how she had learnt of it. None of her siblings spoke about it so she must have been alone. 

Maester Luwin also said that even if Bran did wake up, he might become simple-minded. Arya did not want to consider that. It was too painful to think of. Bran was the smartest of her siblings. Their lives had changed in a single moment. Arya saw him climbing and feeding the crows at the top of the First Keep as she spoke to Aegon. And then he screamed. She ran to him. He stood up, she shouted at him and the next moment he collapsed from the injury to his head. 

In the days since then he had shrunken. Gone was her nimble brother, the boy who would be a knight. In his place was a shrinking sack of skin and bones. Mother fed him a honey and water and herb mixture but that seemed to do little for him. Mother herself had also shrunk. Her red-rimmed eyes were socketed inside deep dark pits, her hair was tangled and unbound. 

A week ago, Arya had been in the room with her mother and Sansa. “I don’t want to go to King’s Landing,” she told them. It had been something that she’d been debating ever since Bran’s fall and her conversation with Aegon. Her father rarely spoke of Robert’s Rebellion and Maester Luwin did not teach them what happened beyond the great touch points. The Mad King killed Brandon and Rickard Stark, Rhaegar Targaryen seized Aunt Lyanna, the Mad King called for Father and Robert’s heads, and they went to war to overthrow him. They were taught that the Mad King had beheaded their grandfather, not that he had burnt him to death while their uncle watched, with Princess Elia and Ethan Glover and the entire court. They weren’t taught about Princess Elia’s loss, about the months she spent with Father trying to get to Aunt Lyanna. Arya supposed her father had tried to save them from learning of his pain. They were taught that Aunt Lyanna loved Robert and that he had gone to war for her. They weren’t taught that she was married to Rhaegar, unable to escape the tower for fear of both the Mad King and her own betrothed. They weren’t taught that she had a son. That Jon was that son. That Father had to hide him from the man who was his best friend for fear of him. There were many reasons for Arya to disbelieve Aegon but she found, the more she thought, that she could not. It was almost as if Ghost had sensed a kinship in him the night she watched them through Nymeria. He’d sought him out and settled under his touch. Their wolves were temperate with their household and the guests but they had never been the first to approach a stranger. There was also the fact that Father never ever spoke of Jon’s mother. It would make sense if she was Aunt Lyanna. He always spoke of her with such sadness, seldom spoke of the war and remained tight-lipped whenever the subject came up. Aegon told her that they made it to the tower as she died. Father had been with Princess Elia, Prince Oberyn, Lord Glover, two other lords and old Martyn Cassell who still lived in Winterfell. Aunt Lyanna had died in a bed of blood fearing for her son. Every time she imagined it, she felt a deep sadness for Father and often went back to her conversation with him in the Wolfswood the day she ran away with the old direwolf and Nymeria. “ _ I worry for you, Arya,”  _ he told her. _ “My sister was just like you. She had a wildness in her. ‘The wolf blood,’ my father used to call it. Lyanna had a touch of it, and my brother Brandon more than a touch. It brought them both to an early grave. I want to protect you from that but I want you to know happiness too. I don’t want to fail you,” he admitted, “like I failed them.”  _ She had asked him what he meant by those words but he only said, “ _ I will not burden you with all my sins _ .” She wondered whether he had blamed himself for what befell his siblings. That made her saddest most of all. 

And there was what she heard in the crypts on the day Uncle Benjen left Winterfell. Arya had gone to the crypts to leave flowers for the aunt she had never known. Uncle Benjen was there before her. “He looks so much like me at that age, Lya,” he was saying. “You would be so proud of him. I’ll be able to keep a closer eye on him now. Ned and I made sure he didn’t throw his life away. He has no faults like we do.” That convinced her more than anything else. Jon had wanted to join the Night’s Watch and she remembered Uncle Benjen trying to convince him not to join. She fell over a stone when he noticed her. 

“Arya?”

“Uncle.” She looked down to her hands. “Father said Aunt Lyanna liked flowers.” He smiled ever so fondly as he looked at her statue. “She did.” He told her stories of their childhood. He told her how they used to play sticks in the godswood with her and how they were always the closest of their family. 

What Arya hadn’t understood was why Father would continue to side with a king he did not trust. Every time Arya looked at the king now she felt a hatred she couldn’t explain. She hated him for Jon and Aegon who had to be bastards even though they were trueborn, for the aunt she never knew, for Princess Elia who lost her daughter and could not be with her son and for Father whose life had been peaceful before he arrived. Ever since the King’s arrival he looked weighed down. It didn’t help that her parents had been arguing over Father’s decision to grant Jon his own lands. 

With Bran bedbound, Arya found no reason to travel south anymore. She was only going because Bran was as well. 

“You can’t stay!” Sansa shrieked. “The queen is expecting you to come with me!” 

“I don’t care about the queen.” Arya did not. She’d only spoken to the woman once and even then it was clear she cared little for Arya. “I’m not leaving Bran.”

“What are you going to do for him?” Sansa demanded to know. “The king and queen will be expecting us and we can’t just change our mind. We’re leaving in a week!” 

“Enough!” their mother rebuked them both. “Enough. Arya you will go with your sister. She will need her sister with her.” Sansa had never needed Arya a day in her life. 

“Now both of you leave,” she said. “I wish to be alone with Bran.” Ever since that day, Arya’s pleas fell on deaf ears. They would leave for King’s Landing tomorrow. 

She left Bran’s room to ask Gage to have more of the honey, water and herb mixture sent up. She’d just left the kitchens when she saw Jon and Princess Elia. They were arm in arm and the princess was telling Jon something that made him laugh. All around the yard people moved about packing goods into wagons. Most northern lords had already left. These wagons belonged mainly to the king’s party and those of their household. Arya stopped to watch Princess Elia and Jon. For a moment she imagined her mother laughing with him in that way.  _ Would he have stayed in Winterfell if she loved him like that?  _

She walked over to stand beside the princess when Jon walked off. For a while they were silent, just looking out at the yard. “Thank you,” Arya told her. 

“For what?” Princess Elia’s kind face looked confused.

“For what you’re doing for Jon. Not every woman can do what you have. My mother certainly never could.” 

“What do you mean? Jon is easy to-”

“I know about Jon...and Aegon,” Arya clarified. 

It took the princess a moment to make sense of what she intimated and her smile made way for a deep inhalation. Had Arya not known what scared her she might not have picked up on it. So good was her ability to rule her face. 

“I haven’t told anyone,” Arya clarified. “I know why you have to keep it quiet. Aegon told me...well...he didn’t just  _ tell  _ me. I heard the two of you. On the night of the wedding. I wasn’t  _ trying  _ to listen, I just heard but I haven’t told anyone. I promise.” She realised she was babbling - she had a habit of doing that. So she only hugged the princess. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I won’t tell Father or mother about Aegon so he can keep coming to see you, if you like.” 

She spent the afternoon with Princess Elia, asking her about Aunt Lyanna and Rhaegar and why she was so good to Jon. “He’s my children’s brother,” was all the princess said. 

She also couldn’t help but ask about Ashara Dayne. “I thought Father didn’t speak of her because she was Jon’s mother. Was she truly the woman he loved before he married my mother?” 

Princess Elia only said that her father loved her mother as he should. No one who actually knew Ashara Dayne would tell her the truth about why her father wouldn’t speak of her. 

When she got back to her room, Septa Mordane had called her wicked and hopeless for not packing all her things already. 

“My brother is half dead,” Arya pointed out. “I’m sorry packing clothes haven’t been very high on my list of priorities.” 

“I have packed all of my things,” Sansa told her. Sansa did everything properly and always seemed to please the septa with everything she did. 

Arya had hoped if she didn’t pack her things they’d let her stay home. Clearly not so. All of her clothes were thrown across her bed and the septa had a polished ironwood chest, bigger than she was, dropped off. 

Night dragged past the hour of the bat. Arya still had clothes to fold and things to pack but she felt a sudden need to be with Jon. For a moment she was not herself but Nymeria, running with Ghost in the godswood.  _ Do they know they will be separated?  _ The two wolves were mostly inseparable. Even though Arya saw little of Jon since Bran’s fall, she had not felt so distant from him because Nymeria was always with Ghost and wherever Ghost was Jon was not far behind. When tomorrow dawned, however, she would not have even that. Tomorrow Jon would leave for Deepwood Motte and Arya for King’s Landing, each of them taking their wolves. She was filled with longing even though they hadn’t yet left. The longing came with guilt as well, a gnawing feeling that sat over all else, greying her world, deadening her. More than once she regretted speaking to Aegon. She regretted learning a truth she could not share and remorseful for making a promise as hard to keep as it was to hold on to a burning coal. To tell Jon was to set afire every truth he knew about his life as the son of Eddard Stark. Even so, she would have told him if it wasn’t for Aegon’s reminder that there was a reason that all who knew had never said anything. They were the ones who’d seen first hand what was at stake. It was too dangerous, Aegon said. These past days she had spent so much time with Bran out of worry for him but also due to her own cowardice and the heavy burden she now carried. She found it hard to see Jon, to know how much he wanted to know who his mother was and to be unable to tell him. There was no one she could talk about it to either. There was Princess Elia of course, but she stayed in Winter Town and Arya seldom left the Great Keep let alone the castle. 

Arya had never known a life without Jon. The longest time they spent apart were the times when she would travel with Father or he would do the same. They would always be reunited within weeks. Not so this time. Even if she came back - which she very much intended to do so, unmarried - he would not be here. He would be lord of his own lands. Arya didn’t know when they’d see each other again. That made her feel adrift, a kite without an anchor. 

The castle was mostly asleep but Arya knew the way to Jon’s room like the back of her hand. She had made the trip in the dark so many times as a child. When she was really little, she shared a bed with Sansa so when she woke up from a nightmare she’d burrow herself next to Sansa. But as they grew, the two of them became diametrically different people such that Arya could not imagine doing the same. Sansa became a lady their mother could be proud of. Graceful and gracious and embarrassed by everything Arya did. She couldn’t seek comfort in her sister any longer so she’d always go to Jon. He never laughed at her or called her childish. He’d get up, even when she woke him up in the middle of the night and he would listen to her and stay up for hours on end speaking to her. She hadn’t been to his room at night ever since she flowered however. That was deemed too improper even though he was her brother.  _ He’s not your brother,  _ Aegon Targaryen’s voice whispered to her.  _ He is mine.  _

The moon followed her as she sped past the diamond shaped windows of the Great Keep, past Sansa’s room, and her parents’ where Father slept alone. She went past Robb and Wylla’s, Bran’s, and then Rickon’s and finally she was at his door. Arya pushed the heavy oak door, careful not to make noise. The moon awaited her, staring down at her through his unshuttered window and bathing the room with a source of light other than the dying fire. A cool breeze came through the window, pleasantly offsetting the heat that radiated through the walls of the Great Keep. Jon was abed and asleep already. She wondered whether he was dreaming he was a wolf right now. She didn’t know why she was here or what she intended but she just was. She’d fled her room for here and now she was she didn’t know what to do. When she was younger she would have woken him up by now. She would have entered the room talking but now she stood there almost as if she was a ghost here to watch him silently. Jon stirred, growling as he did so. Arya sat on the edge of his bed, looking down at him, trying to see any resemblance between him and Aegon but she only saw her own face and her father’s and Uncle Benjen’s but she did not see his brother. When he grunted again, she began to stroke his hair. It seemed to calm his movements. After tomorrow she might never see him in this way again. If her parents had their way she’d be lumbered with a lordling, lady of a castle that was not her own. And if Jon had his way, he’d be lord of his own castle, husband to some undeserving woman who would only want him for his title and who would hold his attentions so much so that he might forget Arya altogether. The thought filled her with an ugly feeling with ugly thorns that stretched out, wrapped around and stung her heart. Jon would marry. Of course he would, just as Robb did, just as Sansa would to the prince but the thought of some woman replacing her in Jon’s life was too hard to bear. She didn’t want a husband and she would never replace Jon with someone else. He had a new life though and every lord had to have a lady. And that lady, whoever she was, would probably not hide the truth from him. Jon would definitely replace Arya in his life with someone else if he found out what she did. She realised when a salty tear streamed past her lips that she was crying.  _ Stupid.  _ She wiped the tears away. She had no reason to cry. Not really. She didn’t even have a reason to be here. She had lots of clothes to fold and things to pack anyhow. 

“Arya.”

She woke him up. Stupid idiot she was. 

“Are you alright?” Jon sat up, wiping the sleep from his eyes. “What are you doing here?” 

“I...couldn’t sleep.” It wasn’t a lie. She couldn’t sleep until she’d finished packing. She wasn’t tired either even though she probably should be sleeping. It would be the last time she’d sleep in a featherbed for who knew how long. 

“You’re crying.” His eyes widened and his hold on her hand grew tight. “Has something happened to Bran?”

“No. He’s… still the same.”  _ Alive but not living.  _

He let go of her then, his relief palpable. “What is it then?”

“We...we might not see each other again for a long time. I-“ Her throat burnt so hot she couldn’t get the words out. 

He smiled. “You?”

“I missed you already.” That only made him smile wider. “Can I stay here?” she blurted, keen to fill the silence. “Like when we were children?”

“Arya…” He looked past her to the moon. “I don’t think that’s proper. If anyone comes in here now-“

“I don’t care. Won’t you miss me?” She sounded whiny even to her own ears. Stupid tears returned to her eyes. “This is the last time we might ever do this. When we next see each other you might have a lady of your own and we’ll never get to lie like this and talk and-“ She was babbling again. So, “Fine,” she said instead, feeling even worse than she did before he awoke. “I have things to do anyway. Goodnight. I am sorry for waking you.” He didn’t want her there. 

Before she could get up though, he grabbed her wrist. “Stay,” he murmured. He lifted the furs. “Come in,” he said, just as he used to when they were children. Arya grinned like an idiot when their eyes met. She kicked her boots off and gave herself to the warmth of his embrace and the furs he wrapped around them. Sometimes, when huddled in his arms, she felt a happiness that seemed to defy all description. It was an overwhelming joy, a contentment that wrapped around her like a cocoon of belonging. 

“I have missed you, Arya,” he breathed into her hair. “It’s felt as if we’d already left.” She had been in her mother’s presence for most of her days which meant Jon hardly visited Bran unless he was with Robb or Father. 

She looked up to him. There was a tenderness in his eyes that made her feel as if her heart was on fire. It was so strong a feeling she found it difficult to speak, as if a stone had lodged itself in her throat and the heat of her heart found release only through the burning of more tears in her eyes. Instead, she raised her hand to seek his hair. Whenever she had her hair loose, as she did this night, he’d muss her hair and call her little sister as they laughed and teased one another. Except she wasn’t truly his sister. Arya didn’t want to muss his hair, it almost felt as if laughter would disturb the quiet of the night. So she ran her fingers along his scalp, stroking his dark hair softly. Jon closed his eyes. His lips parted to make way for a contented sigh. Arya felt a tightening in her core that made her rub her thighs together, a heat that seemed to pulse with her heart. 

It was nice to lie here like this, for a few moments she even forgot that they would be leaving tomorrow. It was as if only this night existed, this bed and the two of them alone. Even when Jon spoke of Deepwood Motte and The Gift and the taxes he’d have to pay the Night’s Watch, Arya felt a warmth wash over her as if he were speaking of someone else’s life and his was only here with her. Except it wasn’t as the as yet distant dawn reminded her through the slow lightening of the sky from charcoal to a dark indigo. When the sun arose their separation would begin. And as reality came crashing down on her so too did other thoughts as unwelcome as water in her leaking ship of dreams. She imagined the faceless, nameless lady who Jon would marry again. She would be the one listening to him as he spoke of his dreams of the future. She would be the one he held within his arms, under the furs, gazing up at the moon. It would be her who laid her head on his chest, comforting herself with the sound of the beating of his heart, breathing in his scent. Arya didn’t know why thought of this stupid lady taunted her. But it did. It rankled and it hurt. When it shouldn’t. It was the natural way of things. Jon would marry just as she was expected to as well. 

And even more unwelcome than the thought of the wife she despised was where her mind took her as he continued to speak. Arya looked up from his chest as he continued to speak of what she could not say. Her mind imagined a world that never was, never could be. A world where everyone knew he was the son of Aunt Lyanna. A world where Aegon was his brother, a world where  _ she _ could be that nameless, faceless woman. She wondered whether he’d choose her in that world.  _ I know him best,  _ she told herself.  _ We’ve always done everything together.  _ Jon had never cared that she couldn’t sew or sing or play the harp. And she had never cared that he liked to hide in the shadows. She liked him even more for it. She ran her eyes down from the curve of his brow, past his eyes, and nose and lips and the tuft of hair that grew in the space between his bottom lip and chin. He was speaking but Arya couldn’t hear a thing.  _ Would you choose me? _ She would choose him, she thought. _ He sees you as a little sister he feels sorry for not a bride,  _ another part of her reminded her.  _ And you’re a liar.  _ Of course she could never be that lady. She was just his annoying little sister even if she wasn’t truly. Jon didn’t know the truth, couldn’t know the truth or else Father would have told him and all their family. Jon would choose someone beautiful and kind and a lady. She was just Arya Horseface. Anyone who did marry her would only do so for her name. She was a second daughter and of even less importance in the grand scheme of things than even baby Rickon. Stupid. Only someone as stupid as her would dream such silly dreams. Not even Sansa would think like this. He was her brother. No one thought such things about their brother. Except he wasn’t. She only let her mind take her to these places because of it. She didn’t think such thoughts of Bran or Robb. She wasn’t a deviant. Or a Targaryen like Jon and Aegon. Arya told herself it was only because she wanted their lives to be the same. If she could will it, they’d never leave Winterfell. And they’d be as they always were. She only imagined that lady because things would be different between them, not because she wanted him like that. She didn’t. He was still Jon.

She should leave. She knew she should. He  _ was  _ right for reasons he knew not. It felt improper for her to be here, wrapped up in his furs and arms. And yet she didn’t leave his bed. She didn’t want to, couldn’t. She wanted to savour this moment for it would be the last. He’d probably find some lady of a Glover Vassal in their time apart. A Forrester or a Wood she reckoned. 

“I don’t want to leave,” she whispered. “I don’t want  _ you  _ to leave either. I…” She was crying again. Stupid. “I want…” 

He said nothing. He only put his hand on her cheek and rubbed small circles with his thumb. That tender look was back in his eyes. The one that made it hard for her to speak because he looked at her with love and trust and she knew and hid the biggest secret of his life from him. Would he still look at her like this if he ever found out the truth? She tried to reassure herself with the beating of his heart, placing her head above it as if the slow drum could calm the tumult inside her own. She felt a sudden pricking of tears in her eyes. 

“I will see you soon, Arya,” he said.

“We don’t know when so you can’t say soon.”

“Yes, I can. Princess Elia said we could visit Dorne…King’s Landing is on the way to Dorne.” 

That made her smile. “Really? You’d come!” 

“I’d like to see King’s Landing.” His grin made her happy. “Speaking of Dorne, Aegon was looking for you before he left. He said it was important. Did he ever find you?” 

“Yes. My mother kicked him out of Bran’s room when he came.”

“What did he want?” 

He made her promise not to tell Jon again. He said he hadn’t told anyone she knew who he was or who Jon was either. ‘ _ My life, Jon’s, your father’s, my mother’s, all our lives are in your hands.’  _ “He...he’s-”  _ Your brother.  _ “He’s Princess Elia’s son.” She promised not to tell Jon who his parents were. She didn’t promise not to tell Jon who Aegon was. 

“What?” Jon got up to lean on his elbow. 

“The Mad King. He saved his own family but kept Princess Elia and her children hostage during the war. When King’s Landing fell, a courtier saved Aegon. He couldn’t save Princess Elia and her daughter but he could save the baby. He didn’t know what would happen but just in case the worst happened, he saved her baby. He gave her another one, who looked like her son. But...when the sack happened, you know what happened that day. Princess Elia didn’t know if her son made it out alive for months. And when she found him again, she could never say her son was alive because they’d kill him. They tried to kill Queen Rhaella and her children too. Someone saved Prince Viserys too but he died. Did you know the man who tried to kill Aegon crushed his head and tried to rape Princess Elia with the blood still on his hands? That’s why she had to hide her son because they’d do it again. So Aegon has to be a bastard now and he’s only ever seen his mother four times. Isn’t that sad?” She sighed loudly. “We can’t tell anyone, Jon.” 

“Poor Princess Elia,” was all Jon said. “I won’t tell anyone. I promise. Although,” he added with a laugh. “I knew it was too good to be true. A princess and a bastard.” 

“Not really. If a bastard was to get a princess it would be Prince Oberyn’s.” He joined her in laughter but her mind wandered. 

“Would you ever hate me?” She realised she said the words out loud when his fond smile made way for a bewildered one.

“What?”

“Aegon can never tell people who he is but at least he knows who he is. If you were in his position…if someone had to lie to you about who you were, would you hate everyone who hid it from you?”

Jon didn’t say anything. He only looked out at the moon. 

“Is there anything I could do that would stop you from loving me?”

“Did something happen, Arya? Did someone say anything to you?”

_ Yes.  _ “No.” She bit her lip. Trying to calm herself, Arya inhaled deeply, only to take in his scent, soap and pines and  _ him _ . “I just wanted to know.”

Jon lifted her chin so she had to look into his eyes. “I will never stop caring for you.” Though his voice was as hard as Father’s could be, his eyes were soft, the way they always were with her. It only made her cry again. 

“What’s this now?” he asked, wiping the tears away from her cheeks. 

“We will never be the same again. Tomorrow we’ll both leave and the next time I see you, you may be a married man, perhaps you’d have a family of your own and...you would never make time for me like this again.” 

He kissed her brow. “You wouldn’t need me then, Arya. Remember what Arianne said. You might find yourself a golden knight in the south. King’s Landing is a big city. I’m sure you’ll find someone there who will make you forget me.”

“I wouldn’t!” She wouldn’t. “I don’t even  _ want  _ to go to King’s Landing. It’s Sansa who’s marrying the prince. She will have Jeyne and Septa Mordane and even the princess. I just want to stay here. I want you to stay here with Bran and Robb and Rickon and I. I don’t want any of us to leave.” And there it was. The source of their argument when he said he’d leave for the Wall. It wasn’t the Wall or Deepwood Motte that made the difference but the fact that their lives would be upended because of it.

“Arya,” he sighed. “I cannot stay here. Winterfell is Robb’s-“

“Winterfell is ours. All of ours!”

“All of yours. Winterfell belongs to the Starks. I am no Stark, little sister. And with you and Father gone, your mother does not want me here. It’s not my place.”

“It is.”

“Arya…”

“And I’m not little!”

“No?” he said with a soft laugh. He was close enough she could feel the warmth of it on her face. “The only person smaller than you is Rickon and  _ he’s _ five.” She kicked him in the shin for that. And soon the two of them were laughing and tickling each other as if they were children again. 

“Promise me,” she said. “That you would never hate me.”

He promised without even a thought. Arya hoped he would be true to it if he found out the truth she kept from him.  _ Father would have told him if it was safe,  _ she said to herself as she walked back to her room. She reminded herself of Aegon’s words and Princess Elia’s too.  _ It wasn’t safe. _

When morning came Septa Mordane took out all her things from the chest and said she had to fold them all over again. It was the worst waste of time. It’d all get messed up again anyway. 

“A proper southron lady doesn’t just throw her clothes inside her chest like old rags,” she said. 

“I’m not a southron lady!” Arya shouted back. “I am a Stark of Winterfell and I will not redo what I’ve already done!” 

Any hopes she might have had at winning the argument faded when he mother said, “Enough,” in an exhausted voice from across the corridor. She was still in Bran’s room. “Arya, do as the septa says. Septa Mordane, close the door.” 

It wasn’t fair. Wylla and Wynafryd’s septa was nice and Tyene’s mother, Septa Lemore was fun but Arya was stuck with a septa who hated her and who focused on the most stupid of things like folding clothes that would be messed up by the time they got to King’s Landing. They wouldn’t let her leave her room. Jon was leaving and they wouldn’t let her go. Septa Lemore had Heward outside her room to make sure she finished folding her clothes. Fat Tom was always easy to trick but Heward not so. 

“The blue dress,” Arya pointed out. Arya sat on her bed, pointed at a wisp of silk or velvet, wool or leather and Nymeria would grab it. It made the job faster but not easier. But then she sat down on her haunches and yelped. Arya glanced behind her.  _ Jon!  _

She threw her arms around his neck. “I was afraid you were gone!” Her breath caught in her throat. She thought she would not get to see him before he left. “They wouldn’t let me out to say good-bye.” 

“What did you do now?” He looked amused, when he let her go. So she told him everything. 

“It’s just as well,” he said. “I have something for you to take with you, and it has to be packed very carefully.” 

“A present?” Her grin took up half her face. 

“You could call it that. Close the door.” 

The thought excited her. She went out to check the hall. Heward was speaking to Wyl. “Nymeria, here. Guard.” Nymeria sat outside with Ghost and Arya shut the door. The last thing she saw was the two of them huddled together. When she turned around Jon was pulling out the present from the rags he wrapped it in. Her eyes went wide. “A sword.” Her voice was hushed. He got her a sword. Only the Martells and the Sands ever cared for gifting her weapons. Septa Mordane took away the dagger Prince Oberyn gave her and the other gifts the Sand Snakes and Princess Arianne gave her. 

The scabbard was soft grey leather, supple as sin. Jon drew out the blade slowly. The steel’s sheen was a deep blue. “This is no toy,” he told her. “Be careful you don’t cut yourself. The edges are sharp enough to shave with.” 

Arya rolled her eyes. “Girls don’t shave.”

“Maybe they should. Have you ever seen the septa’s legs?” 

She giggled at him. “It’s so skinny.”

“So are you,” he said. But she wasn’t so skinny any more, nor very little. 

“I had Mikken make this special. The bravos use swords like this in Pentos and Myr and the other Free Cities. It won’t hack a man’s head off, but it can poke him full of holes if you’re fast enough.” 

“I can be fast,” Arya said. 

“You’ll have to work at it every day.” He put the sword in her hands, showed her how to hold it, as if he hadn’t been playing sticks with her since they were children. And then he stepped back. “How does it feel? Do you like the balance?” 

“I think so,” Arya said. 

“First lesson,” Jon said. “Stick them with the pointy end.” 

Arya gave him a whap on the arm with the flat of her blade. Of course she knew that. “Septa Mordane will take it away from me.” 

“Not if she doesn’t know you have it,” Jon said. 

“Who will I practice with?” 

“You’ll find someone,” Jon promised her. “King’s Landing is a true city, a thousand times the size of Winterfell. Until you find a partner, watch how they fight in the yard. Run, and ride, make yourself strong.” Arya didn’t want anyone else. She only wanted Jon. She wished they could be together. 

“And whatever you do…” he said. 

Arya knew what was coming next. They said it together. “… don’t … tell … Sansa!” Sansa had never been able to keep a secret. Ever. 

Jon messed up her hair. “I will miss you, little sister,” he said. She had to bite her lip to stop the tears from pouring out. Jon was about to leave but he smiled at her like he was only going to winter town and not like someone who she would not see again for maybe years. “I wish you were coming with us,” she told him.

He smiled so kindly at her. “Different roads sometimes lead to the same castle. Who knows?” he said. 

Arya ran to him for a last hug. 

“Put down the sword first,” Jon warned her, laughing. She set it aside almost shyly and showered him with kisses. 

They named the sword Needle and as Arya watched him ride away with Lord Glover and Princess Elia, she wished from the bottom of her heart that their different roads would lead back home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Arya is feeling...some feelings...
> 
> Regarding Aegon, Arya promised not to tell anyone about Jon. She didn’t promise to hide Aegon’s parentage from Jon. Just from her mum and dad lol. I think she would not tell anyone else because of the risk posed to him but Jon loves Elia and I think she feels guilty about all she’s having to hide. 
> 
> I was going to do another chapter in Winterfell with Cat but GRRM has already done that fantastically. Assume everything happens as it does in canon. The assassin comes to kill Bran, Cat goes to King’s Landing etc. All my chapter was going to do was have Cat stewing in her hate for the fact that Jon will be a lord. She would have spent the entire chapter being sure Jon was definitely Ashara’s son since the Dornish are making such a big effort to make him feel included lol. I was going to write her arrival in King’s Landing from Ned’s perspective. All that was going to happen there would be boring small council meetings, Arya and Sansa would still be fighting because of everything at the Trident. We were going to see him be nosey but again, all that is in the books. Go and read them. All that was going to be different in that chapter was Varys was going to make a throwaway comment in a small council meeting that the Golden Company broke their contract in Myr but Littlefinger dismissed him like “Who cares about a sellsword company breaking their company? Let’s talk about how in debt we are to the Lannisters.” So you know...just imagine it lol.
> 
> We catch up with Ned sometime in the future next and he’s headed for a...confrontation with Robert Baratheon. Dun, dun, dun.


	26. Eddard

Tomard and Hullen brought her in. Ned sighed wearily, looking up from the tome Jon Arryn had been reading, ‘The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms.’ There had never been a duller book. 

Hullen told him of how she had been found threatening the Gold Cloaks with their heads on spikes.

“I didn’t threaten them,” Arya corrected him, with folded arms. “I simply said that if they didn’t call Vayon Poole or Jory _then_ you would have their heads on spikes...They weren’t letting me in!” 

Ned rubbed his face in his hands as Hullen continued his report. He often wondered how a child this testing had come out of his loins. _The wolf blood. How often had Father been this inflamed by Brandon? Yet when it mattered most, Father proved his love._ “Thank you, Hullen. I will take it from here.” Ned watched his men leave. For a while he said nothing. He simply appraised her. She did not look hurt which was a cause for gratitude. _Well, nothing more than the scrapes and bruises she had sported ever since I got her this Braavosi._ She bit her lip but said nothing, no doubt waiting for him to shout and rage as her mother might have. 

“Father-” 

“You realise I had half my guard out searching for you?” he finally said. “Septa Mordane is beside herself with fear. She’s in the sept praying for your safe return.” At that she gave him a look of incredulity. Her relationship with the septa, her sister and their household had degenerated to unimaginable levels since the events at The Trident. “Arya, you know you are never to go beyond the castle gates without my leave.”

“I didn’t go out the gates,” she clarified before rectifying herself. “Well, I didn’t _mean_ to. I was down in the dungeons, only they turned into this tunnel. It was all dark, and I didn’t have a torch or a candle to see by, so I had to follow. I couldn’t go back the way I came. Father, they were talking about killing you! These two men. They didn’t see me, I was being still as stone and quiet as a shadow, but I heard them. They said you had a book and a bastard and if one Hand could die, why not a second? Is that the book?”

“Arya, what are you talking about? Who said this?” 

“They did,” she told him. “There was a fat one with rings and a forked yellow beard, and another in mail and a steel cap, and the fat one said they were yet to move in Myr but the other one told him he couldn’t keep juggling and the wolf and the lion were going to eat each other and it was a mummer’s farce and that this Hand was not like another. This Hand could not be delayed too long. Then the other one called him a wizard and said something of the fallen-” 

“Arya,” Ned laughed when he put together the mummer, the wizard and the juggler. It was a welcome levity since the news of the Lannister’s attempt on Bran’s life came to him. “They were mummers. There must be a dozen troupes in King’s Landing right now, come to make some coin off the tourney crowds. I’m not certain what these two were doing in the castle, but perhaps the king has asked for a show.” 

“No.” She shook her head stubbornly. 

“They weren’t—” 

Ned raised a hand.“You shouldn’t be following people about and spying on them in any case. Nor do I cherish the notion of my daughter climbing in strange windows after stray cats.” He moved to stand opposite her, taking her hands in his. “Look at you, sweetling. Your arms are covered with scratches. This has gone on long enough. Tell Syrio Forel that I want a word with him—”

He was interrupted by a short, sudden knock. Desmond was without, a black brother had come to see him. Ned hoped most for his brother in the wallowing cesspit in which he found himself. Benjen could be his only true counsel. “He says the matter is urgent,” Desmond added. 

“My door is always open to the Night’s Watch,” Ned said welcoming him in. He was an old wandering crow but it had been a wandering crow who had once captured their attention at Harrenhal. “What is your name, good man?” Ned asked him. 

“Yoren, as it please m’lord. My pardons for the hour.” He bowed to Arya. “This must be your daughter m’lord. She has the look.” 

Ned looked fondly down at her. She of all the children of his loins had their look. He wondered if that had been the reason for her wildness. “Did Benjen send you?” He’d gotten the raven a week earlier signed Benjen Stark, Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch after the Old Bear’s death. 

“No one sent me, m’lord, saving old Mormont.” 

“On that account, you have my condolences.” Ned realised as the words left his mouth that the man had not known of his Lord Commander’s death. “I got word a week ago.”

The man said a short prayer for his commander before stating his business, intimating that it was too private for Arya’s ears. Ned sent her out with Desmond, promising to speak to her later. 

“I’m here to find men for the Wall, and when Robert next holds court, I’ll bend the knee and cry our need, see if the king and his Hand have some scum in the dungeons they’d be well rid of. You might say as Benjen Stark is why we’re talking, though. His blood ran black. Made him my brother as much as yours. It’s for his sake I’m come. Rode hard, I did, near killed my horse the way I drove her, but I left the others well behind.”

As Ned listened to the man tell him of Cat’s capture of the Lannister Imp, he sank into his seat, taking in words his brain had struggled to comprehend. “...Some went galloping for Casterly Rock, and the Rock lies closer. Lord Tywin will have gotten the word by now, you can count on it.”

_Oh, Cat. What have you done?_

“I need to see the king.” 

“His Grace is busy,” Jaime Lannister spat. “Return in the morning.” 

“I must speak to him-” His words were swallowed by the sounds of the moaning of more than two people on the other side of the door. Robert. _Do men not outgrow such things?_ His sister’s words came to mind then. _‘Love is sweet, dearest Ned. But it cannot change a man’s nature.’_

“As I said. The king is busy. Return in the morning,” repeated the Kingslayer.

Ned looked glowered at him with disgust. _Does he know his brother tried to kill my son?_ Robb’s raven said Bran said he could not remember what happened. _Though he also said Bran had seldom said a word since he heard of the attempt on his life._ Was his child hiding something for fear? There was little Ned wanted more than to return home to his child and wife. Just this afternoon he might have said, _if I am still in King’s Landing it is because I am yet to uncover the truth of who ordered the death of my son. That and who killed Jon Arryn._ Now, he needed to stay to prevent a war Catelyn may have inadvertently started. He had to convince Robert to see his side before the Lannisters got word. _That and find proof that the Lannisters had ordered Bran dead._ “A sweet piece of steel,” Littlefinger called the dagger. “ _But it cuts two ways, my lord. The Imp will no doubt swear the blade was lost or stolen while he was at Winterfell, and with his hireling dead, who is there to give him the lie?” He tossed the knife lightly to Ned. “My counsel is to drop that in the river and forget that it was ever forged._ ” The boy Mycah came to his mind not as he was the last time he saw him. But as he was in Winterfell that day Arya had taken him riding. He thought of Jon Arryn’s sudden death, of Bran’s fall again, of old mad Aerys Targaryen dying on the floor of his throne room. Grey eyes stared out at Green. Ned fingered the dragonbone hilt of the Valyrian steel blade. 

With the next evening finally came a summons. Robert was in the small council chamber before him, sitting, unusually, at the head of the table as a king should but _he_ rarely did. Ser Barristan sat to one side of him, Renly on the other. Varys was to his right, Pycelle next to him and Littlefinger opposite. Ned took his seat. “Your Grace,” he said in greeting. 

The king threw the chalice in his hand before Ned could sit. “I will have that scheming bitch’s head!” he barked. “Her and her brothers!” 

Ned looked at Ser Barristan’s ashen face. From where he sat he could see the Lord Commander’s throat move with his gulps. Renly looked disinterested, if a little smug. Varys’ eyes bore into Ned and his mouth curved into a scheming smile. Whatever he knew had riled Robert and he all but titilated as he waited to share it. Littlefinger’s face was unreadable. Ned did not even bother to study Pycelle’s face. By now the Lannister woman was aware of what had so riled the king. Littlefinger had said, “The king tells the queen too much.” If she knew, as her pet, _he_ was already aware. 

“What is it, Your Grace?” 

As Varys began to relay this news, Ned found himself floored for the second time in as many days. _It cannot be._ His ears must have been hearing false words. Ned asked Varys to repeat his words once, twice, a third time. _Ashara. Prince Aegon...Jon Connington. Ghosts of the past._ His innards felt as if charging horses pulled them in different directions. Shock that she was alive and the child with her, relief - _Ashara lives._ He felt the burning in his eyes but willed the tears away. He could not have feelings for a woman dead for seventeen years. _Ashara._ And yet he let the relief wash over him. _Ashara is alive._ He almost smiled. He wanted to. Oh, he wanted to. _I didn’t kill her_ . _How is she?_ His heart thrashed against his chest as if he was still a boy racing against Robert in the Vale. Or the ridiculously shy young man he was in her presence. 

Elia’s child had allegedly made it alive of the hell of Tywin Lannister’s making too. That had elicited a silent laugh akin to a gasp from him. Then came the feeling of deception that these words might be true. “On whose word do you bring this news?” 

“I have a friend, in Pentos, named Illyrio Mopatis,” answered Varys. “He says that the boy has been raised under the sponsorship of a Norvoshi magister these past seventeen years by Lady Ashara Dayne.” Even at the sound of her name, Ned’s heart could have stopped. “Jon Connington is said to have joined them later.” 

Even with all the hope that blossomed in his heart, “Is this a joke?” Ned retorted in disgust. He remembered the scene as he came upon Elia all those years ago. She was bloodied, crying on the floor. Her clothes were ripped. Gregor Clegane stood over her, slipping down his breeches with the blood of her child all over his hands. She had already lost her daughter by that point. Ned had carried Princess Rhaenys in his arms. He gulped loudly, feeling the grief and regret return to his heart. “This is nonsense,” he declared resolutely. “We all saw Prince Aegon’s body. _How_ can he be alive?” Ned had travelled with the princess for months. He had seen her carry unimaginable grief, grief that sat with her even now such that she would lose consciousness over seeing Robert’s banners and the lion of Lannister. 

“The bitch had the gall to call me a child-killer, to speak to me of visiting her children in the Sept of Baelor when all this time she knew her child was alive!” 

“Robert, enough.” Ned was teetering on impropriety for this man was his king and not the boy he grew up with. “If this was Elia’s son why would he be raised by two ghosts when he has living uncles and a mother? This is some pretender. Leave him to his pretence. Jon Connington is dead. So is Ashara.” Ned had to inhale then. “Prince Aegon is dead as well. Are we to believe that ghosts have returned to the world?” 

“My lord,” Varys said in his tittering voice, “The Magister says that Lord Connington’s death was a feign aimed at allowing Lord Connington-”

“He is no Lord!” barked Robert. Jon Connington had killed their friends at the Battle of the Bells and would have taken Robert’s life had Ned not arrived with Hoster Tully. 

“Pardon me, Your Grace. The lie was to enable _Jon_ Connington,” the eunuch clarified, “to raise the boy in secret without anyone knowing of his survival until he was ready to reclaim the throne of House Targaryen.” 

Ned noted Robert bristle in his seat at the mention of the Targaryen’s throne.

“Robert,” he said. “If the boy was alive, he would have no need of Ashara or Jon. His own uncles would be the first to support him.” 

“That is why we are here,” Varys said. “The Martells know of the boy’s survival and have been protecting him ever since, my lord. The Norvoshi magister in question is Prince Doran’s good father and I hear that Prince Oberyn killed Viserys Targaryen himself to protect the boy’s life and claim to the throne. They saved him and raised him in secret. In fact,” he paused. “Oberyn has been claiming him for his bastard.” 

Blue hair, a bastard, Elia’s shock at seeing the boy with Robert, swordsmanship he had only ever seen in one person all flashed before him, all came to Ned’s mind. _Arthur._ It all started to make sense. Ned should have known. He should have known. Damn him. He should have known when the men who were prepared to kill him left without a second word... _They left with no trace._ They did not go to make a last stand at Dragonstone as he expected. Why would they if their prince’s heir was elsewhere? Ned knew then that the wall of lies he built to protect his sister’s trust were at risk of coming down. To the world the three knights of the Kingsguard had died in Dorne. “Who else has been seeing to the boy’s care?” 

“I have only heard of his uncles, Jon Connington and Ashara Dayne.” Varys’ eyes bore into Ned as if he were searching for Ned’s own secrets. He had lived with his lies for so long now no one would find them there. 

“The boy was last seen at Winterfell, my lord-” Varys continued before he was interrupted by the raging king. 

“Do you remember him? That smug blue-haired bastard who refused to bend the knee? I should have caved in his chest then. That black-hearted bastard’s dragonspawn had the gall to stand before me, and look into my eyes and his bitch mother all but accused me of killing her children while her son was there, and alive!” 

Consolation battled betrayal in Ned’s heart. He had taken the Martells into his confidence only to receive none in return. _You are here with their enemy. Why should they?_

“This is falsehood,” Ned began to say. “I do not believe this news. Ashara is dead and Jon Connington drunk himself to death. Your own Spider brought us that news.” Ned tilted his head to look at the eunuch. 

“Damn you, man. Have you no ears?” Robert threw the jug of wine at the wall. “Those bastard desert dwellers have kept the boy hidden! I will have their heads for this!” 

“If this news was true, which I do not believe it to be,” said the man who _knew_ it to be true. “Why did they not get Elia and Rhaenys out of the city too?” 

“My lord, I understand that the Princess was only able to get Aegon out of the city because it was easier to replace one baby for another. The Princess Rhaenys was recognisable by all and sundry - and Aerys would have known if Elia herself had escaped. Fearful for herself and her children, faced with such a terrible choice and an unpredictable outcome, the princess chose to see at least one of her children survive. I understand she had him sneaked out by a Dornish courtier.” 

“And am I to believe you had no prior knowledge of this? Is it not your job to know such things?” 

“My lord, you will appreciate that we were living in a moment of crisis with a king keen to see the realm burn-” 

“Why would the Martells wait this long to crown the boy?” 

“They mean to raise up support for him! There are those who still call me usurper-” 

“The boy is what? Eight-and-ten by now? And we have heard not a peep from him. It may be that they are pleased to know the boy is alive.” Ned turned his eyes to The Spider. He had never liked the eunuch. “Have you had word that the boy means to lay claim to the throne?”  
“No, my lord-” 

“Have you heard of him making any marriage alliances?” 

“No, my lord-” 

“There you have your answer,” Ned said, cutting him off. He leaned back in his seat. “This boy, if he is indeed Aegon, might be content to live out his years in Norvos. Or with his uncles. Let us learn the truth of this matter and if necessary-” 

“I _will_ have all their heads!” Robert slammed his fist down on the council table, loud as the blow of his hammer. “They hid the boy-” 

“You let Viserys Targaryen live. Why should you hide from the shadow of another Targaryen?” 

“The boy need only marry and he will have an army. How many houses stood against us, Ned? I will have his head. They hid his survival!” 

“Are you surprised?” Ned scoffed. “When you should have given them justice as their king, you laughed at Elia’s pain. Why _should_ she tell you?” _Promise me, Ned._ His sister’s last words came flooding. _Rhaegar is dead. Robert will kill me, Ned and he’ll kill the baby too. Promise me you won’t let him Ned, please promise me. Please you have to stop him Ned, please. He will kill him. .. I don’t want to die, Ned._ Why wouldn’t Elia have the same concerns as his sister? 

“I am king!” Robert stood, heaving. The other councillors did their best to pretend that they were somewhere else. “I will kill them all for this.” 

“You will dishonour yourself if you do this. You should be pleased he is alive-” 

“Pleased? The Others take your pleasure-” 

“Aegon being alive will wipe some of the dishonour of your conquest, Robert. It was wrong of Tywin Lannister to have those children killed. You conquered the Iron Throne. It is yours by right. Exile the boy, make peace with the Martells...What do you have to fear from knowing this child is alive? You were content to let Viserys live-” 

Renly spoke for the first time then. “We ought to have had Viserys killed years ago, but His Grace my brother made the mistake of listening to Jon Arryn. It makes no matter. He is dead now and my brother is right to want _this_ boy dead-”

“Mercy is never a mistake, Lord Renly,” Ned replied, reminding him of how Robert had once pardoned Ser Barristan when he was presented to the injured and near-death. 

“It was not the same,” Robert complained. “Ser Barristan was a knight of the Kingsguard.”

“And Aegon is a boy who has thus far not proven a threat to you. As for Elia and her brothers, they are a concerned mother and her brothers trying to keep a boy safe. When you hear word of this boy’s conquest let us speak of war but for now leave them to their-”

“I am not so blind that I cannot see the shadow of the axe when it is hanging over my own neck, Ned!” 

“There is no axe, Robert. There is no indication that the boy is a threat. Allow me to speak to Elia-” 

“There will be no speaking!” Robert banged his fist into the table again. “I will have his head. I will have all their heads!” 

“Robert, I ask you-” Ned knew he was wearing the king’s patience. “What did we rise against Aerys Targaryen for, if not to put an end to the murder of children?” 

“To put an end to Targaryens!” the king growled.

Ned thought of Jon, of Elia and Ethan Glover and of the blue-haired boy who made his daughter laugh in a way she hadn’t since they left Winterfell. An unwelcome thought came to his mind. _Could this son of Rhaegar...my Arya?_ He shook his head. “Your Grace, I never knew you to fear Rhaegar.” He fought to keep the scorn out of his voice, and failed. “Have the years so unmanned you that you tremble at the shadow of his child?” 

Robert purpled. “No more, Ned,” he warned, pointing. “Not another word. Have you forgotten who is king here?” 

“No, Your Grace,” Ned replied. “Have you?” The man who sat across from him was a stranger in all but name. _What happened to the man who was once my brother?_ Grey eyes held blue in challenge. 

“Enough!” the king bellowed. “I am sick of talk. I’ll be done with this, or be damned. What say you all?”

“The boy must be killed,” Lord Renly declared. 

“We have no choice,” murmured Varys. “Sadly, sadly, they have brought him to your realm, Your Grace. There is little else to be done.” 

“There is plenty else to be done,” Ned interjected, sick of the sycophants. “Exile the boy. Let him live in the Free Cities. I have never known Elia or Doran to be unreasonable. They would rather the child lives than see him die in pursuit of a throne that is yours by right, Your Grace. Let me speak to her.” 

Ser Barristan had the decency to support Ned’s argument while old Pycelle spoke of the terrors that war would bring, giving his advice as a man who serves the realm. Ned restrained the urge to roll his eyes. Pycelle had been the one to convince the Mad King to open his gates to Tywin Lannister. Both children might have been saved were it not for him. 

Littlefinger spoke of assassins, saying, “When you find yourself in bed with an ugly woman, the best thing to do is close your eyes and get on with it. Waiting won’t make the maid any prettier. Kiss her and be done with it.”

“You will make enemies you do not currently have with this act, Robert,” Ned warned him. 

“I will not be cowed by some desert dwellers!”

“Desert dwellers who could not be cowed by dragons.”

“I spit on dragons and their spawn. I will have that boy’s head and that scheming bitch’s too! Now who can we find to do-”

“Do it yourself, Robert,” Ned taunted him with disgust. “The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. Look him in the eyes before you kill him as you did his father. This boy who has done you no harm. You owe him that much at least.”

Robert's eyes widened before he scoffed bitterly. 

“And when you do it, know this,” Ned continued. “I will not have no part in murdering an innocent child or his concerned mother. Do as you will, but do not ask me to fix my seal to it.”

A king was seldom defied and it showed on Robert’s face that he had never been refused since he donned that crown for the gravity of Ned’s words did not dawn on him immediately. “You are the King’s Hand, Lord Stark. You will do as I command you, or I’ll find me a Hand who will.”

Ned raised his hand to where the token of his office was pinned to his tunic, ripped the heavy clasp off his person and threw the pin on the table. “I wish him every success.” He looked at the face of the man he loved. “I thought you a better man than this, Robert,” he told him. It was a heavy thing to despair of someone you love. “I thought we had made a nobler king.” That realisation broke Ned’s heart more than anything he’d seen of his old friend so far. 

As Robert raged and his face purpled, Ned walked away. He heard him shout about having Ned’s head on a spike. If the truth came out, he did not doubt that his head would be on said spike. 

With regret, he left for the Tower of the Hand. There was still so much to resolve in the south. There was still so much Ned had yet to learn about Jon’s death, about the attempt on Bran...and then there was the matter with Cat. News of that would reach King’s Landing soon. Ned had hoped he could salvage some sort of resolution by speaking to Robert first. There was little hope of that now. But for a miracle, war was returning to Westeros. 

He spent the long walk from the small council chamber battling between being pleased for Elia to feeling betrayed and finally, coming to an understanding of why she may have kept tell of her son secret. Had Ned not done the same to his own family? He had no doubt the boy was Rhaegar’s. He was of the right age. And his own experience had taught him there was little a brother would not do for his sister. Oberyn Martell had been baying for blood when they had met all those years ago. He was so like Brandon, that only news of the child’s survival could be enough to calm him. 

And Ashara. The thought made him smile despite the madness he found himself in. _Are you truly alive?_ It was enough for him to hope that she was alive, even if he never saw her again. As long as he hadn’t been the one to cause her death, as long as she lived to see all the sunrises and sunsets of the past seventeen years. As long as she lived and loved and laughed. Her laugh… He wondered whether she had married Jon Connington, if the man was truly alive. He could not begrudge her a right to happiness, not when he had been the one to break both their hearts. Had he not found love with Catelyn? Would he finally be able to look up at the night sky in the knowledge that she too might be seeing the same stars? Would he look up with hope this time instead of despair? 

By the time he reached his solar, Ned had come to make a peace with what the Martells had done... if only it was to ensure the boy’s survival. He would protect the boy as best he could. However, lining him up for a claim to the throne was another thing entirely. Ned tried not to contemplate that. 

His first order of business was to order Vayon Poole to get him two ships that would leave this night. The first was to head for Dorne. That one was found easily enough. More than one merchant ship to Oldtown docked at the Blackwater and stopped over at Sunspear. Ned sent Tomard on the first one. He was to instruct Doran Martell to send the boy out of Westeros. Doran was then to block the Boneway and the Prince’s Pass. If Robert insisted on calling for this boy’s head, the least he owed House Martell for all they had done to save Jon was to protect them as well as he could for now. And the best way for him to do that was by sending one man alone. He made sure Tomard was dressed in homespun wool and trailed by more of his own men to see he made it on to the ship. His instructions could only be delivered by mouth. Ned trusted Tom would not speak even if caught. Stark men were notoriously loyal. He had seen it himself. Some things were too dangerous to write, words of treason most of all. 

He asked Vayon Poole to find him another ship to take him home. When news of the Imp arrived it would be best for he and his daughters to be out of this city. Robert cared nought for the man but in a black rage who knew what he might do? The man was his good brother. He would rather take the Kingsroad but given the way things transpired, a ship was his safest bet. He could even stop by Dragonstone to visit Stannis and gain a better understanding of affairs in the hope of guiding Robert to see the true threat to his realm. It was such a hard thing for a man to despair of someone he loved. When they were children, Robert would rage but he always saw the error of his ways. Ned could only hope that he did so still. Jon was the one made to guide kings. Ned’s place was in Winterfell - away from this all.

While he waited for Vayon Poole to return, Ned shared tell of what had happened with Jory Cassell, the captain of his household guard. The Cassells had been part of their household since before Ned was born. Martyn, Jory’s father, was of his most trusted men: those who knew what had transpired in the Tower of Joy. 

“I must get word to Ethan Glover,” he confessed. He had spent the long walk contemplating whether Ethan had known of the prince and came to the conclusion that he could not have. There were few men Ned trusted as he did his brother’s one-time squire and his own lifelong friend. Ethan had never betrayed him. “I mean to have Princess Elia and Jon hidden at Greywater Watch until the King’s ire passes.” Ned hoped it would for if it did not he would be pulled into war - and this time he may be forced to stand against Robert, though he hoped he would not. Even as he made preparations to leave, he hoped against hope that Robert would see reason. “I must get word north, as soon as possible.” 

“Lord Baelish to see you, m’lord,” Desmond announced. Ned was half tempted to turn him away, but thought better of it. He was not free yet; until he was, he must play their games. “Show him in, Desmond.”

There were few people Ned so despised as he did this man Cat described as her brother. Littlefinger told him that Robert was still searching for someone to instruct to kill the boy. Tom was at sea by now. He would get there first.

The events of the rest of that night would be ones that Ned regretted deeply. He had followed Littlefinger to a brothel, visited a girl Robert had fathered a bastard on - a girl Jon Arryn had visited before his death. 

Just as the burden of one of the boulders of sin he carried with him all these years was lifted, more were placed on his back. For no sin of their own, for their association with him Wyl and Heward paid with their lives at the hands of Jaime Lannister who was keen to exact revenge on Ned for Cat’s actions against The Imp. All Ned remembered as the rain fell and fell and fell was holding Jory’s limp, armless body. He was still breathing but unconscious. Around him were the bodies of his men. Ned’s own leg was crushed underneath his horse. The bone of his calf stuck out. “Hold on, Jory,” he cried. His tears mingled with the rain. “Please don’t die. I could not lose you too.” The last thing he remembered was looking up to a starless sky.

\--

_He ran outside the man cave with his sons, the black, and the two greys. Wolves hunted in packs and he had three of his children, all but his lost daughter in the south, the son to the west and the dead one... How they howled that night._

_They separated out and surrounded the beast. It was a deer this time. His black son went for the flank. It dodged him. The second went for the shoulder, he caught it but it found its legs and darted. The third chased its rear. He watched, he waited and went for its neck. Even with his limp, he caught it, and put it down._

Ned came up for air. His throat was desert parched. 

“My lord…” a voice seemed to say in the distance. 

“Water,” he croaked. The sheets were tangled about his legs. A dull throb of pain shot up his side. “How...how long?” 

“Six days and seven nights.” The voice was Vayon Poole’s. The steward held a cup to Ned’s lips. “Drink, my lord.” The water tasted sweet as honey. “The king left orders,” Vayon Poole told him when the cup was empty. “He would speak with you, my lord.” 

“On the morrow,” Ned said. “When I am stronger.” He could not face Robert now. The dream had left him weak as a kitten. 

“My lord,” Poole said, “he commanded us to send you to him the moment you opened your eyes.” The steward busied himself lighting a bedside candle. Ned cursed softly. Robert was never known for his patience. “Tell him I’m too weak to come to him. If he wishes to speak with me, I should be pleased to receive him here. I hope you wake him from a sound sleep. And summon …” He was about to say Jory. “What of Jory?” he asked instead, grief settled once more in his heart.

“We brought back Jory alive, my lord.” Ned could have sworn he had never heard sweeter news. “Where is he?” 

“He insisted on travelling north, my lord. He said you had word that must be delivered. He lost the arm. We found a novice from the citadel to travel to White Harbor with him. He should be half way to the north by now.” 

Ned smiled through cracked lips. No one was more loyal than a Cassell and Jory was his father’s son. “And what of Wyl and Heward?” 

“I sent Cayn with Jory to take their bodies back to Winterfell, my lord.”

“Good,” Ned said. The least they deserved was to be buried beside those for who Winterfell remained grateful. Though he would still wish to have them alive. The Lannister’s quarrel was with Ned. His men should not have had to pay for it while he remained alive. He would have given his life to see Jory remain whole and Heward and Wyl still alive to one day marry and father children of their own. The grief grew with every breath, rising and rising. It never abated by the deep breaths Ned took in. 

“Who is now the captain of my guard?” 

“Alyn, my lord.” 

“Good.” A stout young man. Vayon Poole left and Alyn came in to tell him of his daughters. Sansa prayed and cried. Arya, he heard, had not spoken a word since his injury. “I have never seen such anger in a girl,” Alyn said of her. 

“Whatever happens,” Ned said, “I want my daughters kept safe. I fear this is only the beginning.” 

“No harm will come to them, Lord Eddard,” Alyn said. “I stake my life on that. They are asleep now. There are guards outside the room they share. I thought it prudent to keep them together and well guarded. Tell of Lady Catelyn’s actions are on everyone’s lips, my lord, and the Kingslayer has fled for Casterly Rock.” 

“And is there news of Cat?” 

“None yet, my lord.” 

That concerned Ned somewhat.

“And from Dorne?”

“None from there either, my lord.” 

He told himself no news from there was good news. 

Alyn was updating him on events since his injury when Vayon returned with Robert. With him was the Lannister woman. _Come to gloat no doubt._

Robert had offered him some wine when she began her venom-laced taunts. “A man in your place should count himself fortunate that his head is still on his shoulders,” she began before she was silenced by Robert. 

Robert inquired about his leg, assuring him that it would heal clean and then asking if he knew of what Cat had done. 

Ned said that she had done so on his orders, though he wished such a thing had not happened if only because his men might still have been alive. 

Robert grumbled about not being pleased, and the Lannister woman spoke in defence of her brothers and accused Ned of being drunk and attacking the Kingslayer as if Robert had not known him since they were boys. She was finally silenced with a slap to the face that even Ned had recoiled from. And as they argued, even despite his hate for the woman, he could only think of Lyanna in her place. Lyanna’s tongue was even more uncontrollable. _Would this have been her end?_

When they were finally alone, Robert lamented of his marriage, spoke once more of Lyanna and exhorted Ned to lay the matter to rest and ensure the release of The Imp. 

“Your Grace, we must talk,” Ned had begun to say when Robert interjected. 

“I am sick unto death of talk. On the morrow I’m going to the kingswood to hunt. Whatever you have to say can wait until I return.” 

“I shall not be here on your return. You commanded me to return to Winterfell, remember?” 

Robert stood up, grasping one of the bedposts to steady himself. “Here, this is yours.” He pulled the heavy silver hand clasp from a pocket in the lining of his cloak and tossed it on the bed. “Like it or not, you are my Hand, damn you. I forbid you to leave.” 

Ned picked up the silver clasp. He was being given no choice, it seemed. His leg throbbed, and he felt as helpless as a child. “The Targaryen boy-” 

The king groaned. “Seven hells, don’t start with him again.” 

“I must, Your Grace. Why would you want me as your Hand, if you refuse to listen to my counsel?” 

“Why?” Robert laughed. “Why not? Someone has to rule this damnable kingdom. Put on the badge, Ned. It suits you. And if you ever throw it in my face again, I swear to you, I’ll pin the damned thing on Jaime Lannister.”

“Then you might have to, Robert. I mean it. All I ask is that you allow me to speak to the Martells. If it is war they want then we can revisit this but allow me to make a peace. All I ask is for a chance, Your Grace.” Ned hoped against hope that his brother was still there.

Robert considered him for a long while. “You would choose them over me?”

“I would choose to save the life of a child we once failed, Robert. And I know you to be a better man than you tell yourself you are.”

Robert held his eyes. And then the man Ned loved made an appearance. He nodded. Ned had prayed for a miracle. It seemed he’d got one. _For now._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Arya heard less in the dungeons than she did in canon. She won’t assume that Jon is the bastard because clearly she knows the truth about him. She’s not going to speak of monsters because she’s 14 not 9. So Ned has less to work with (because you know narrative purposes). Though in canon, he should have realised the truth of Arya’s words once he realised why the wolf and the lion would come to war because of the twincest. Of course the book and Gendry would be of importance then. Having said that, I get it. He had so many issues to deal with and was maybe partly high on milk of the poppy. 
> 
> Varys is a messy eunuch who lives for drama. I think I was right to not have a Varys POV lol. I like him causing chaos in the background.
> 
> Ned was already sick of King’s Landing by this point and was preparing to lock himself away in the north given his instructions to Cat - INSTRUCTIONS SHE DOESN’T EVEN DELIVER!! I’ll get to my anger at that in the notes of the next chapter. So while in canon he resigns for Dany’s baby, I wouldn’t put it past him to resign for Egg because he’s been presented with the story of a boy who’s just chilling with his family & isn’t seeking a throne (sound like any other son of Rhaegar you know?) He wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of the Martells either because well, they know all the skeletons in his closet and I think as angry as he might be, he’s been through too much with Elia to leave her in the lurch. Also...Ashara is alive :0. 
> 
> I skipped Jaime attacking Ned in the street because again, all that is in the books - read them, they are much better than my reimagination. 
> 
> As you might be able to tell, I have a real love for side characters. That’s why Benjen is not lost over the Wall. In this world, he is Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch because it’s the least he deserves. And the Old Bear gets a natural death rather than being killed by his own men. 
> 
> In canon, big-hearted Ned sends out so many of his own men to hunt down The Mountain - it’s why he’s so vulnerable during the throne room scene. Of course The Mountain is dead in this timeline (and Ned sending out his men hasn’t happened yet but imagine it does later - I won’t cover it on page). I don’t doubt that Tywin Lannister has a whole host of unsavoury men to do his bidding. Choose one of them in your headcanons or make one up. I mention all this just to say that I didn’t think Ned would miss two more guards leaving. Cayn and Fat Tom both have little boys in Winterfell (Tom Too and Calon who are Bran and Arya’s friends).
> 
> I really wanted to save their fathers for them. Both guards die during the throne room scene in canon. 
> 
> I also thought it imperative to save Jory. He’s such an amazing character and his poor daddy is still alive in this timeline. I couldn’t make old Martyn Cassell grieve a child. Also Ned crying over Jory’s dead body in the torrential rain is too painful a scene to recreate so Jory lost an arm but our boy is fine otherwise and has left for Winterfell to see that Ned’s instructions to Ethan are delivered.
> 
> Cayn went with him to take back the bodies of Heward and Wyl who died in the attack on Ned outside the brothel. Poor guys - they were just having fun in the scene directly before that. I wish I could save them but I needed some gravity to the scene. 
> 
> Last but not least, Ned is trying to hold a gaping hole in the earth together with sellotape.


	27. Catelyn

**Catelyn**

When they first set off, even as her thighs cramped and her rear ached with pain and a downpour dragged down thick blackened clouds, Catelyn set a punishing pace to The Eyrie. That first day she would have said that as a daughter of Riverrun, the roaring deluge that soaked her clothes and pierced her skin could do little to dampen her spirits. Rain had been her companion growing up.

She had captured the man who ordered her son killed and she would see to it that justice was done. Catelyn comforted herself with the satisfaction she felt when swords were drawn against Tyrion Lannister. She smiled as he remembered the way his mouth dropped open in disorientation when she seized him. The Riverlands were her own lands, the North her husband’s and The Eyrie was her sister’s. She would make the Lannisters regret this crime. 

Two days in however, Catelyn was not so sure how satisfied she should feel. Her vindication began to be soured by doubt. By now they began to put down horses, while others died from exhaustion. But she could not stop for too long at any one place. She continued on in a gruelling pace to escape the men she was sure the Lannisters would have sent after them by now - even if they would be riding north and not east.

Oh, the Lannister man had been clever. He surrendered to the king’s justice while reminding all the men in the inn that his father would want to know what became of him. “He’d pay a handsome reward to any man who brings him word of what has happened here,” he said. Cat did not doubt that Tywin Lannister would - and every man in that Hall knew that too. Noble or not, all knew that a Lannister always paid his debts. And if they did not know that they knew that Lannisters shit gold - Tywin Lannister more than most. She also realised that even as she basked in the gratification, arresting the Imp by reminding each man in the hall of the oaths their lords had sworn to her father, her success was not as total as she would have liked. There were at least four dozen men there but her plea had only roused a dozen, if that. She did not miss the fact that the captain of the Frey men did not bestir himself for her even when two of his men stood in response to her call. Her father had named Walder Frey, Late Lord Frey after the Battle of The Trident once the war was won. He had a son who was married to Tywin Lannister’s sister. If he had to choose between her father and Tywin, Cat could not say with a certainty that he would stand against the Old Lion. And that did not bode well. She tried to push thoughts of war away. She tried to think that she had not created problems for Ned. She looked at her bandaged hands, thought of her son, and the man sent to kill him. She was a Tully of Riverrun and married to a Stark of Winterfell. She would see justice done. Lysa would welcome her to The Eyrie, together they would find out the truth and with her husband as Hand of the King, the Lannisters would pay. There would be no other choice. 

When the rain finally stopped, Catelyn gave a command to dismount, to give her men, the men who followed her on account only of their loyalty to her father, a moment’s rest to eat and make water. Dawn seeped through in fingers of light enlightening the snow dusted peaks of the Mountains of the Moon. Here the land was harsh and forbidding. The High Road unlike the Kingsroad, or the Riverroad of her childhood, was little more than a stony track leading into The Eyrie. They could not stop in the night for fear of shadow cats and the mountain clans she had heard were little different from the wildlings in the north. But with the light of day coming, Cat decided to give them a moment. 

The Lannister was carried off the horse lent to him after his own was killed and eaten by the men. Her worry was assuaged for a moment by the shock on his face when he realised where they were. 

“This is the high road,” he gasped, looking at her with a look of disbelief, like a man from who all hope departed. _His father will not be sending men here._ “The eastern road. You said we were riding for Winterfell!” 

Catelyn could not stop the smile that blossomed on her face. Ned Stark did not marry a fool and a Lannister Imp could not outsmart her. “Often and loudly,” she agreed. “No doubt your friends will ride that way when they come after us. I wish them good speed.” She enjoyed the look of despair that darkened his face even as she herself had doubted her choice. 

Lady Whent’s man, her own lady aunt, had been the one to request a longer rest. He looked stiff-necked and exhausted. Ser Rodrik, stout, steadfast Ser Rodrik, was quick to agree with him. “The horse we lost in the night was the third one, my lady,” he said. 

“We will lose more than horses if we’re overtaken by the Lannisters,” she reminded them. Her legs cramped and she could scarcely stand straight but she had to get to The Eyrie.

“Small chance of that here,” the Imp quipped before a man-at-arms of House Bracken hit over the head. The Lannister did his best to ignore him. “This is a cruel land, Lady Stark,” he admonished, “You’ll find no succour until you reach the Vale, and each mount you lose burdens the others all the more. Worse, you risk losing me. I am small, and not strong, and if I die, then what’s the point?”

“It might be said that your death is the point, Lannister,” Catelyn reminded him. 

“I think not,” he mocked. “If you wanted me dead, you had only to say the word, and one of these staunch friends of yours would gladly have given me a red smile.” 

“The Starks do not murder men in their beds.” 

“Nor do I,” he said. “I tell you again, I had no part in the attempt to kill your son.”

“The assassin was armed with your dagger.”

“It was not my dagger,” he insisted. “How many times must I swear to that? Lady Stark, whatever you may believe of me, I am not a stupid man. Only a fool would arm a common footpad with his own blade.” 

“Why would Petyr lie to me?” Petyr Baelish was like a brother to her. He had protected her in King’s Landing and helped her get out alive. She would trust him with her eyes closed. 

“Why does a bear shit in the woods? Because it is his nature. Lying comes as easily as breathing to a man like Littlefinger. You ought to know that, _you_ of all people.” 

Catelyn took a step forward to the Imp, irritated by his speech. “And what does that mean, Lannister?” 

Tyrion cocked his head mockingly at her. “Why, every man at court has heard him tell how he took your maidenhead, my lady.” 

“That is a lie!” She balled her hands into fists, trying to ignore the urge to slap the liar. She took a moment to breathe, to calm herself. She readily admitted that Petyr had once loved her, a child’s folly nothing more. “His passion was a tragedy for all of us,” she admitted. “But it was real, and pure, and nothing to be made mock of. He wanted my hand. That is the truth of the matter. You are truly an evil man, Lannister.” 

“And you are truly a fool, Lady Stark. Littlefinger has never loved anyone but Littlefinger, and I promise you that it is not your hand that he boasts of, it’s those ripe breasts of yours, and that sweet mouth, and the heat between your legs.”

This time, Cat could not restrain herself. She struck him in the face. 

Undeterred, he continued speaking, asking about how he was alleged to come across the dagger and as Cat spoke to him, she found it difficult to doubt the certainty with which he spoke. _Lannisters are liars,_ she reminded herself and her son nearly died for it. She looked down at her maimed hands. _Petyr would not lie to me._

“Riders!” one of the men shouted. She ordered the horses guarded and the prisoners too. 

The Imp demanded a weapon. Catelyn knew he was right. Wildlings cared not for the quarrels of major houses. “Arm him,” she ordered before grabbing a dagger herself. This time she did not have her son’s wolf to protect her, no Ned, or her father. She had these men who would be fighting for their lives. Cat steeled herself. If they did not kill her, they might choose to have their way with her. She would not allow them to take her alive. 

First came the rocks that rained down on them, amidst hoots and hollers of the wildlings. They rode at them on emaciated horses and poor halfhelms; they bore no heralds, and carried no banners. They only came and came and came at them as hard as the rain. From there the battle moved too fast for her. The clanging of swords filled the air. Frightened horses brayed, arrows hissed and men shouted. _Winterfell, Harrenhal,_ the Imp shouted out _Casterly Rock._ Lady Catelyn had no role to play here, she sank back to the stone face of the mountain. She had hoped to slip away unnoticed. Not so. She was the only woman here. Before she knew it, she was trapped. Three men surrounded her. One was mounted and the other two on foot. She tried to spy Ser Rodrik; he was busy fighting for his life, as were all the men. They had already lost a man, a Mooton. Her back was against the rock. They had her pinned. She raised the dagger, clutching it awkwardly, raised her chin and stiffened her spine. She would not beg a bunch of wildlings. They knew not what courtesy and chivalry meant. Whether or not she begged the end result would be the same but Catelyn Stark would not let them take her, without killing them or herself. They raised their rusted swords. For a long while, she just stared down at her feet, willing her body to move. Her limbs felt heavy as if unable to execute her command. Then suddenly, thankfully, they did. Cat lunged forward, hoping to strike one in the neck but missed. He jumped back and lunged back at her. The strike felt like a punch to the gut. He pulled back. Cat noticed the red on his sword. _It must have been there before._ The Imp came then. He caught a man in the back of the knee. The one that had struck her jumped out at Tyrion Lannister. Cat lashed out at him from behind and opened his throat. The third one galloped off. The wildlings were defeated. Ser Rodrik had dispatched five of them alone. 

The punch to her gut had winded her. Cat raised a hand to her midriff. It came back scarlet. At the sight of her own blood, her body exploded in agony. She shook her head, trying to force her mind beyond the pain. She reached out. “Ser Ro-” Breathing hurt too much. A fountain of red seemed to flow from her. Her hearing dimmed and the rising sun darkened with it. She felt as if she was lost in a void, her legs could hardly hold her up. She bit at the inner flesh of her mouth. The pain was too much. 

“My lady!” she thought she heard someone say. She could not be sure. Sharp needles seemed to blossom out across her whole body. 

Stout arms came around her. _Ser Rodrik._ “Ser Rodrik, we have...we have to-” words were too difficult for her. He lay her down. That’s when she noticed the wound to his neck. She tried to raise her hand to it but her arms felt like a sack of heavy grain. Their eyes met. “Ser Rodrik...you’re h-hurt.” 

“This is barely a scratch, my lady.” He put pressure on her wound. Cat could hardly keep her eyes open.

“Keep looking at me,” he pleaded. “We will get you to the bloody gate for treatment, my lady. Please. Stay talking, keep your eyes open. You, boy! Come here! Raise her legs. Hold them there.” 

Cat could only take shallow breaths. “Ned,” she sighed and then she could see no more.

She woke up on a hastily fashioned stretcher being pulled by a slow moving horse. The pain was unbearable. She pressed a hand against her wound. Her skin was clammy and her hair stuck to her forehead. 

“Ser Rodrik!” The old knight looked dreadful. She worried, even in her state, that _he_ would not make it. 

Cat was even more useless when the mountain clans fell upon them a second time. She could hardly see anything, forget being of help. This time they lost more men against a better armed group. Ser Willis Wode was also injured this time round but Catelyn could offer them no words of comfort. She could hardly afford anyone any words, she could scarcely think. Fever and chills racked her body. She fell to the call of sleep.

“Oh, Little Cat.” 

Catelyn opened her eyes. Someone was stroking her hair. 

“Why did you not send word?” he asked, gently. “The high road has not been safe ever since Jon Arryn died. You were fortunate to have been found by the Waynwood boy.” 

Even through this fog, Cat would never mistake that voice. It was the timbre of her childhood. “Uncle.” Cat squeezed his hand. The pain was barely noticeable. She managed a slurry conversation.

“Ser Rodrik,” she asked. “Is he alright?” She could not bear to lose the old knight. 

“He is fine. The septon is seeing to him.” 

“Where are we?” 

“The Bloody Gate, little one. I’ve heard what happened by Lady Whent’s man but will you tell me what in seven hells you are doing with the Lannister Imp?” 

Cat looked away from him, focusing her eyes on the hair that cascaded down her front like a coppery fire. Someone had changed her into an ill-fitting dress.

She started from the beginning. She told him of Lysa’s letter, of Bran’s fall and the assassin. She showed him her hands and tried to keep concentrated on the matter of hand even as sleep called to her. She spoke of Littlefinger’s help and her chance meeting with the Imp. Her uncle listened, as he always did. 

“Well I’ve seen to it that he is chained but we must leave soon. Lysa is expecting you and we have a long way up that mountain. I have said you will need further rest but your sister is insistent. She said she’s been waiting for you for two days now.”

“Two!” Catelyn felt despondent. Even as they readied her and two women eased her into a litter, large enough to allow her to lay down, she could hardly help but wonder whether this trip had been worth it. Five good men died because of her and the Lannister’s man died too, of fever. As the chills hit her once more, she was reminded of the Stark words. _Winter is Coming._ Was she ready for it? Had she caused more harm than good? By now, she thought Ned must have heard.

“Any word from my husband, uncle?” she asked.

“None. I take it he doesn’t know.” 

“There were no ravens at the inn,” she joked. 

“We will hear more when we get to Lysa,” he said. They left Ser Rodrik and Ser Willis Wode back at the fortress. She would not leave The Imp behind. The singer begged to come and he reminded her so much of her own daughters’ love of song she found it hard to refuse him. _Sansa would like him,_ she thought. Her daughter had always begged for singers but none travelled as far as Winterfell as often as her daughter might have liked. He reminded her of Arya too who loved songs for a whole different reason, for the adventure they brought. The sellsword, Bronn, also asked to come along and despite all her dislike of the man she found it difficult to refuse him as well. He had fought bravely to get her here. The Lannister rode beside her litter for a while, unchained, and in a shadowskin cloak he plundered from one of their attackers. Her uncle was less than pleased with the Lannister’s presence. “This will not end well,” he warned her. By now Cat had accepted it wouldn’t. The only question was one of degree. _How badly will it end?_

“Your sister is afraid, child, and the Lannisters are what she fears most. She ran to the Vale, stealing away from the Red Keep like a thief in the night, and all to snatch her son out of the lion’s mouth … and now you have brought the lion to her door.” Even as he spoke gently, she knew her uncle disapproved of her actions. _Would Lysa?_

“I have only done this because of Lysa,” she reminded him. Had Lysa not sent her that accursed letter, Cat would have never known of how rotten the Lannisters truly were. The feeling that she had risked everyone she loved had seemed to settle like a rock in her already inflamed guts. _Ned is Hand,_ she reminded herself. _And Robert is like a brother to him._ She had done the right thing. She had not harmed the Imp either. It was her husband’s duty to enforce the king’s justice and she would submit the Imp to it. Be that as it may, Tywin Lannister was not a man who was easily cowed. Aerys Targaryen had learnt that to his regret. _He, Elia Martell and her two children._ As much as she held no love for the Dornish woman, the meddler in her affairs with her husband, she could not ignore the violence that Tywin Lannister was capable of. _As if I could,_ she scoffed. _Everyone in The Seven Kingdoms_ knew the end of the Reynes and the Tarbecks whose ends were memorialised in a song known by all.

Her uncle told her of the mood in The Vale, the anger of the knights and her sister’s own desire to wall up and protect her son. Cat held the cloak tighter around herself. The cold seemed unbearable to her but no one else seemed to notice it. 

“Winterfell is remote,” he said. “And the Vale walled up, but Riverrun lies in their way. You must warn your father.” 

That Catelyn knew. She had Ned’s instructions to send off as well. She was to order Ethan Glover and Helman Tallhart to send one hundred men each to Moat Cailin. _Two hundred determined archers could hold back an army,_ he said. Ned had seen war even before she lit the spark. Perhaps she did not light the spark. Perhaps war would come anyway. 

At The Gates of the Moon, they were welcomed by Lord Nestor Royce from a lesser branch of House Royce. Her uncle had told her how some of the lords whispered he should rule The Vale until Lysa’s boy came of age. Cat had wanted to rest here, such was her pain but Lysa, she learnt, had insisted that she be brought to her immediately. Cat resisted the urge to curse her sister. She had only this day woken from death’s door and her wound still pained her but there was little she could say. She could not find the energy to say much.

A bastard girl, a Stone of The Vale, was her guide up the mountain. Cat was placed in a basket. The girl was polite, keen on keeping Catelyn talking. Perhaps she was worried that Cat would not wake if she fell asleep but Catelyn could not find it in her to speak to the girl for too long. She knew she was being unreasonable. She knew her hatred of her husband’s bastard clouded her judgment against the sweet girl but she could not help it. Not now. Catelyn had never trusted the boy. Bastards were black of heart and her children would never be truly safe so long as he lived and was free to procreate. She had made offerings to the seven faces of her god when he asked to join the Night’s Watch. It was a free choice he made. Starks had manned the wall for centuries and Ned’s own brother was a brother of the Night’s Watch. She did not think Ned would oppose it, not when a bastard had no real future in the north and could rise at the Wall. But Elia Martell had intervened, sticking her nose in business that did not concern her. Ned talked of choosing this future for the boy himself but Cat was no fool. The Dornish woman would whisper with him whenever she was in Winterfell. Her insufferable brother, he of the endless bastards, had negotiated trade between the North and the Free Cities making Elia an influential force in the north. Ned would populate The Gift with that money and Cat did not doubt that the woman demanded her friend’s bastard be made lord as a condition of ongoing trade. She always did champion the bastard’s cause. Most recently she did so at Robb’s wedding, insisting that he sit at the high table with honoured guests including the king himself. Oberyn Martell had smirked at Cat all night long. She had never hated a man more. Ned’s concession to grant the boy lands and the Martells’ interest in him convinced Cat of the truth Ned would never admit to. The boy was Ashara Dayne’s. The Martells had been famous friends with the Daynes of Starfall. _Of course they would look after her bastard._ What hurt Cat most was that Ned’s love of the long dead woman blinded him to the risk the boy posed to their trueborn children. Bastards usurped children born on the right side of the sheet and now that he was a lord himself, Cat worried about her son who was still only an heir. She took a swig of the strongwine she carried with her. When faced with two sons of Ned Stark, one who looked like a southron lord and the other a spitting image of the Starks of Winterfell, who would they choose? Worse still, what if both were Starks? Elia Martell had taunted her with the prospect. She knew that the bastard would have the Glovers behind him. Cat would never let that happen. The Manderlys of White Harbor were the richest house in the north and Cat had done well to agree to the marriage with Wylla. She had not liked the girl, not at first. But her grandfather would do everything it took to ensure her children were not usurped and House Glover and the Martell woman could not withstand them. Or so Cat hoped. 

_Who would Ned choose?_ she wondered. _If his two sons came to war._ Would it be a choice between Cat and Ashara Dayne, a woman dead for the past seventeen years? _I gave him five children and half my life._ Even so, Ned must have loved the woman. He gave her son everything his trueborn children had. 

The bastard girl stopped once, twice and finally a third time. Cat could hardly remember the climb. She drank her fill in strongwine to dull the pain as she fought two battles within herself: one in her heart and the other in her body in a fight for survival. She did not know it then, but Lysa’s insistence to see her immediately had all but killed her.

Her sister had greeted her warmly and with concern, concern that faded the moment they were alone. Cat tried to keep her eyes open as her heart pounded hard against her chest. 

Lysa blamed her for bringing the Imp to her home. “Have you taken leave of your senses?” Lysa snapped at her. “To bring him here, without a word of permission, without so much as a warning, to drag us into your quarrels with the Lannisters …”

“My quarrels?” Catelyn could scarce believe what she was hearing. A great fire burned in the hearth, but there was no trace of warmth in Lysa’s voice. Cat tried to steady herself. “They were _your_ quarrels first, sister,” she reminded her. “It was you who sent me that cursed letter, you who wrote that the Lannisters had murdered your husband.” 

“To warn you, so you could stay away from them! I never meant to fight them! Gods, Cat, do you know what you’ve done?”

Lysa continued ranting but Cat let it pass her by. She felt too exhausted to argue. Her sister had changed so much in the five years since they last saw her. They had clearly been hard upon her. She had grown heavy, her body sagged and her once bright eyes grew watery and dimmed now. 

They were joined by Jon Arryn’s boy, twice as old as her own Rickon and not even half as fierce. He sought comfort from his mother. 

“No one is safe,” Cat griped in reply to her sister. “If you think hiding here will make the Lannisters forget you, you are sadly mistaken.”

Lysa covered her boy’s ear with her hand. “Even if they could bring an army through the mountains and past the Bloody Gate, the Eyrie is impregnable. You saw for yourself. No enemy could ever reach us up here.” 

Had Catelyn the strength she would have slapped her. Her uncle was right. Her sister would be of no help. 

“I am tired, sister.” Cat told her. “I am in pain. I need to see the maester. We will talk further. Please. Have them show me to a room.”

The next day the Imp was presented before her sister. Cat sat underneath her sister’s throne. Lysa’s moods, Cat saw, were prone to shift faster than the direction of the wind. The one constant about her was her inconstancy. Lysa traded threats with Tyrion Lannister. Cat could scarcely follow them, so fatigued was she. 

“Sister,” she called out from where she sat below the thrones, “I beg you to remember, this man is my prisoner. I will not have him harmed.” Cat did not know what to do with him but she would have him judged first.

Lysa had him carried away into her dungeons. For Cat, the next few days passed in a blur. Her wound began to fester. Puss drained out of her belly. With it came bleeding, a burning fever followed by shaking chills. She went in and out of consciousness.

She dreamt of Ned. She dreamt of the warmth of his arms when she shook from the cold. She held Bran in her arms and her own baby Rickon who she should have been with. Her place was in Winterfell. She _had_ to return home. 

When she rose she wondered whether she had created insurmountable trouble for Ned with this action. She wanted to write to him, explain what she had done. By now he would know but the words would not come to her. She was no further forward now than she was when she took the Imp hostage. She would write to him with answers not more problems. _How can I do that if I’m dead?_ She refused to believe that. She would not. She could not die here, so far from home, so far from her children and her husband. _I will see Sansa marry,_ she told herself. _I will see her be queen. Robert will side with Ned and I will return to Winterfell. I will see to it that Elia Martell does not get her wish to see the bastard legitimised. I will hold Robb’s first child within my arms. I will ensure the bastard has no allies._ With Ned in the south, she was the highest authority in the North. She would see to it that the bastard would wish he went to the Night’s Watch.

It took a week before she felt strong enough to stand, even if she could barely walk. Her heart beat violently inside her chest. She felt dizzy but she had had enough of being locked up alone. Her uncle visited her daily but he was often the only one. Whenever Lysa came, Cat knew not whether to expect an argument or a glimpse of the sister she once knew. Whoever Lysa had become now, she was not someone Cat could rely on. Even so, Lysa at least had not yet had Tyrion Lannister killed. He was to confess, according to Lysa, today. She had come to Cat’s room in excitement the night before. 

The eastern sky was rose and gold as the sun broke over the Vale of Arryn. Ser Rodrik joined her and shared news that could only be plucked out of her darkest nightmares. Cat turned her eyes to the torrent of Alyssa’s Tears. If she had the ability to cry, Cat did not doubt that she could rival the waterfall. But she could scarcely concentrate, let alone formulate a proper reply. 

Elia Martell’s son was allegedly alive and when Robert had threatened to have him killed, Ned resigned. Her husband was an honourable man. She wished he did not resign, if only for what she learned happened afterward. _Would The Kingslayer have harmed him if he had not resigned?_

But what set her soul on fire was the name she heard associated with the allegedly dead prince. He was not the only one who’d risen from the dead. Ashara Dayne, it seemed, was allegedly alive. _Did you resign for her, Ned? Do you still love her?_ The pain she felt flowed out in the waterfall. 

Her pain was tinged with anger, however, at the deception of the Martells. If the boy was truly alive they had risked her husband’s life. Ned had protected the Martell woman and she had raised a child in secret; a child who it seemed would claim the throne of his ancestors. And they had dragged her Ned into their games. He was said to be unconscious, at least when the raven was sent. _Was she worth dying over Ned? Why would you resign for her? What of our children? Why would you break faith with your king when we face such odds?_

“Do you truly believe this news is true?” she asked Ser Rodrik. “Does Ashara Dayne truly live?”

“I don’t know, my lady...but this is not the only news that has arrived.” 

Tywin Lannister and his son were amassing an army. Edmure demanded to know their intentions and Edmure spoke to the lords, Edmure sent letters. Edmure. Not her father. 

“Is there something wrong with my father?” 

“There is nothing in the letter to say that, my lady.” 

Not for the first time, Cat said that she should have been woken. Riverrun was her home and Ned was her husband. _Oh, Ned._

How could the boy be alive? Ned had told her the story. He told her how he held the dead Targaryen children. She had seen how haunted his eyes were even as he spoke of his things unfolded that day. He had only ever spoken of it once, early in their marriage when he had risen from a nightmare. Cat had been the one to hold him. She would find out the truth soon. She would speak to her husband. For now, she slumped back into her seat. Cat had hardly the energy to think, let alone write. It was too much of an effort for her to keep her eyes open. 

She had meant to speak to her sister but instead saw her uncle angrily rushing out of her apartments. He had requested a thousand men to take to Riverrun and been declined. “Come with me,” Cat told him. She planned to leave as soon as possible. “The high road is not safe. You cannot travel alone. I will give you a thousand men, uncle. Riverrun will not stand alone.” 

It was clear her uncle wished to go home sooner rather than later, still he begrudgingly agreed. 

Cat had declined milk of the poppy to hear the confession of the Lannister Imp, the man who sought to kill her son. Even so, she wished she could sink back into the shadows. She felt a shadow of herself. Her skin was blotchy and discoloured and her skin remained clammy but it was the pain, the pain she could not cope with. More than once, she considered asking for pain relief. In the end, as they waited, she accepted more strongwine to dull the blinding pain. 

Even as clouded as her mind felt, she did not fail to notice The Imp smile at the singer as he walked in. In that moment, Catelyn regretted acceding to so many of the requests she had. The singer had seemed like a boy keen for an adventure. Now, she realised, to The Imp, he was a way of spreading whatever happened here down south. He was The Imp’s silent threat, even if he himself was unaware of this new status. _Harm me, and my father will know,_ he seemed to say. Then there was the sellsword Bronn seemed more _his_ man than he was Cat’s. 

The Imp walked into the Hall as a man with no fear etched on his face or in his stance. He spoke of wanting to confess, before proceeding to make a mockery of his trial, confessing to non-crimes that made even the stuffy lords of the Vale laugh. But when it came to the crimes he _was_ accused of, he denied them all, demanding a trial by combat and appealing to the honour and justice that the Arryns of the Eyrie prided themselves on. Despite being the prisoner himself, he talked them into a corner. There was no way for Lysa to deny him a trial that would not wound the honour of House Arryn - and Cat knew to deny the king’s own brother by the laws of marriage a trial would be an infringement of the king’s justice rather than its enforcement. 

Her sister was no easy prey, however. She denied him his request to call his brother to stand as his champion. Unfortunately for them, the sellsword Bronn, the one Cat should have refused, said he would stand for the Imp. 

_What is he doing here?_ Cat grabbed the handle of the chair she sat upon. It was him. He followed her here. Jon Snow. She saw him standing there. His eyes bore into her. He smiled deviously at her and signalled with a finger across his throat. 

“What is he doing here?” she asked out loud but no one seemed to hear her. Not even Ser Rodrik. _Where am I?_ She looked around. The Falcon of House Arryn graced the walls. _The Eyrie. I’m at The Eyrie._ She remembered. 

The sellsword knelt before Ser Vardis Egen. A septon stood between them, praying over them. The Imp was there too. Cat’s breaths came out shallow. She grabbed her chest. The septon raised his crystal sphere high and light shattered. Rainbows danced across the Imp’s face. In a high, solemn, singsong voice, the septon asked the gods to look down and bear witness, to find the truth in this man’s soul, to grant him life and freedom if he was innocent, death if he was guilty.

Opposite her grey eyes bore into her. _The bastards eyes. Why is he here? And her! How is she here?_ Next to the bastard stood his mother. _You are dead._ She had to be. Cat refused to believe she was alive. Yet here she was, staring into Cat’s eyes with her haunted purpled ones. The years had been kind to her. But Cat knew she was seeing things. Ned was beside her, holding her close to him, kissing her hair. Ned couldn’t be beside her. He was in King’s Landing. Fighting for his life. She shook her head. _I’m losing my mind._

She remembered where she was. She was in The Eyrie. Tyrion Lannister had demanded a trial by combat. It all passed in a blur for her. It was as if the men faded. All that remained was the ringing of their swords against each other and their grunting and then she was back. This time she looked at Cat and laughed and walked off with Ned. _She is not real. She...she…_ Cat was struggling to breathe. She felt dizzy. Sweat flowed down her back. Her heart raced as if her life was on the line and not the Imp’s. She heard the Vale knight groan, and saw the Sellsword drive down his blade through his ribs. Silence fell upon the Eyrie. The sellsword spat out a tooth. 

Robert Arryn turned to his mother. “

“Is it over, Mother?” the Lord of the Eyrie asked. _No_ , Catelyn wanted to tell him, _it’s only now beginning,_ but the words would not come out. She opened her mouth once, twice, the third time burning bile burst out of her mouth. She vomited it out and noticed all eyes turn to her. She stood. Ser Rodrik held her arm. Cat walked forward and began swaying like a dazed creature. The voices dimmed. Ashara Dayne laughed at her. Her and her son and Oberyn Martell. _When did he get here?_

Catelyn pointed her finger at them. “Ser Rodrik, you have to stop-“ Catelyn crumpled to the ground. Lights danced before her eyes and exploded. 

She awoke in a bed. Uncle Brynden was there so was Lysa. Both of them were teary-eyed. 

“Oh Cat,” sobbed her sister. Cat noticed the septon standing over her. _A septon, not a maester._ Death had many signs if you knew what to look for. This was one of them. 

"I wish..." she began, but she had had no idea what she did want. _Ned safe and alive and beside me._ She wanted her children.

“I want to go home,” she said. “Uncle Brynden, please take me home to Winterfell.” She felt as if rocks had been placed on her chest. “I’m dying.”

“No,” he choked. Tears stained his face. “No, you’re not, Little Cat.”

“I am.” She knew it. How she did not know but this was the end. She did not want to die. Her son. Her children. The bastard. Someone had to stop the bastard. 

“Uncle…” Her eyelids felt heavy. “Take me home to...to Winterfell. I-my son. The Dornish. Don’t let them.” She sighed.

And with that breath her soul floated out. Catelyn Tully Stark lay there staring and unseeing, unfeeling, _gone_. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I started this story, I said that I’d ask the question ‘what if’ during various canon events. The what if here was, what if Tyrion was just a teensy bit late to rescue Cat?
> 
> I think it’s on brand for Cat to blame Ned for resigning instead of recognising that her husband had been attacked because of her actions. With Ashara in the mix this is that bit more likely. 
> 
> I would have loved to write more about her stewing in her distrust of the Martells but she’s supposed to be high on drugs so you know there’s not much in the way of coherent thought.
> 
> One thing that really annoys me in canon is Ned sends Cat off with instructions to warn Lords Glover and Tallhart to send men to man Moat Cailin - perhaps even permanently. She’s also instructed to tell Lord Manderly to see to White Harbor’s defences. She doesn’t deliver a single one of those messages. It’s Robb who himself makes the decision to call the banners. So when he marches for war, he does so without a fully mobilised north. It’s why by the time ADWD comes around, some northern houses still have men to give Stannis. 
> 
> Another thing that really gets on my nerves is Tyrion tells her the lies Littlefinger spreads about her and she doesn’t even once consider whether what Tyrion is saying may be true. She does not send a raven to Ned either sharing what she has learnt, however minimal. A small note to say I’m not sure about LF saying this dagger belonged to Tyrion might have saved Ned from trusting LF with getting him the Gold Cloaks. But she just lets Tyrion’s words go in one ear and out of the other. 
> 
> I suppose being at death’s door gives her an excuse in this timeline…
> 
> This fic has me googling things I have no business googling - like medieval battle wounds and the symptoms of sepsis. So the hallucination and the confusion on Cat’s part toward the end are related to that.  
> I don’t hate Cat. She, like everyone in this world is a complex character. She is not perfect and had understandable grievances and a massive blind spot in her hate of Jon. In this timeline, her hate could even be justified. Ned gives the boy lands and Elia’s intent to mock her with a passing comment about legitimising Jon really plays into her insecurity. So if she seems particularly intolerant of the Dornish, this is why. I wanted to avoid killing her for the sake of it. Here, she dies in the course of an action she took as opposed to a random fall off a cliff or some other random death. 
> 
> I know this turn of events doesn’t provide the catharsis of reading about Cat realising that Jon is a prince, that Egg is king, that Ned trusted Elia more than he trusted her etc but if Cat was to die in this story, it had to feel natural and this was the only natural juncture I could think of for it. Life is also not always full of “aha” moments.


	28. Elia

**Elia**

He put two fingers under her chin, forcing her to look up at him. 

“We will leave in two days, I promise.” 

She wrapped her arms around his midriff, taking in his scent. Elia had been begging for weeks for the two of them to depart for their hut in the Wolfswood. Half a day’s ride from the nearest village, it was an old cabin his father used to retire to when Ethan was a boy. He had taken her there a number of times over the years. ‘ _ My favourite place in the North,’  _ he once said, early on in their marriage. And Elia could see why. Beside a clear water stream, it was built under a canopy so dense only the occasional streak of sunlight made it through - rarely, if ever, touching the forest floor. From the back of the dwelling one could see a white strip nestled between the verdant hills of the wood, a frosted cascade that flowed as if it came down from an endless colossal bucket held up above the grey rocks. Once, in the summer, he pulled her under the waterfall and even as she screamed, the shock of the cold water could not dampen her spirits. It reminded her of another time during their trip through Dorne just after the death of Lyanna Stark. They came across a waterfall after days in the desert. Oberyn stripped down to stand underneath a waterfall to cool down, Ethan joined him and before long, all those men with whom she had lived during the worst time of her life joined in. That was the first time she saw any of them smile since Lyanna Stark died. But even then, Elia’s eyes had been on Ethan. He carried a silent grief with him borne out of the horrors he witnessed as the Mad King’s hostage. Even as her soul burned, even then, all those years ago, something about his smile touched her heart. 

Many a day, they sat outside their hut wrapped in blankets watching the trees sway in the wind. In the nights they’d gaze up at the stars and to the moonlit trees of the wood, talking and laughing and loving well into the night beside a crackling fire that warmed her body as her husband warmed her soul. He’d hold her through the night nestled in a den of quilts all tangled limbs and satiated. Elia felt safe against the curve of his body. When there, she basked in the sound of the running stream that made her feel truly at peace in the otherworldly cocoon her husband had given her. It was their place, so far removed from the call of duty, the guilt that bore her down and the game of thrones. 

“I can’t wait,” she whispered. 

Ethan kissed her brow and left to see to his duties for the day. She, on the other hand, moved to sit beside the window. She gazed out unseeing. She wanted to leave for their hut to finally tell him of Aegon. It was so cut off from the world that it was the only place where she could give him the news that would undoubtedly break his heart. He would rage, she knew. He would be broken by her deceit and she wanted him to be somewhere he could come to terms with her deception without others’ eyes and ears on him. And, selfishly, it was so far from everything that she knew he would not abandon her alone in the woods. It would give her a chance to tell him everything properly. 

Aegon’s conquest would begin shortly and keeping the news of her son from her husband felt as impossible as capturing a waterfall between her fingers. Just as the water would overflow so too would the news arrive. All she could do was act and tell her husband before it did. Perhaps then she would feel unburdened by the weight she carried all these years. Though in her heart she wondered whether one burden would only be replaced by another - one of loss. 

Aegon would reclaim what was his and he and the men behind him, her brothers at the forefront, would unleash upon Westeros the full force of years of pent up vengeance. Jon Connington kindled the fire of revenge in his heart every day for the past eighteen years.Oberyn thought about little else than killing Tywin. Arthur, Os and Ser Gerold prayed to avenge their prince and Doran sought to destroy everything Tywin built. And as much as she awaited the day they avenged her innocent Rhaenys and the stolen childhood of the son she never got to be a true mother to, she could not help but feel as if the storm would blow away everything she built for herself.  _ Help me,  _ she prayed.  _ Help the entire realm when the storm meets these shores.  _

In the world of court it was rare for a man to have no fervent desire to rise beyond his rank. People killed and backstabbed, plotted and schemed just for the hope of getting ahead. In the North, the opposite was true. As ambitious as each northern lord was to extend their influence and their riches, she had never seen her husband’s ambition come before his duties to his liege. Her husband would stand behind Ned Stark whatever came and if Ned chose Robert, she and the man she loved, the man who helped put her back together over the years, would stand on opposite sides. Even here, from her window, far from the room she used as a sept, Elia clasped her hands together in ardent prayer.  _ Save my son, and my husband,  _ she prayed.  _ Save them from facing each other in battle for then I would truly be lost.  _

It had been four months since they returned home from Winterfell and every time she asked for them to retire to the woods, something arose that prevented them. First she fell ill, then her husband had taken Jon and Larence with him to the northern mountains for another wedding. This time a Burley boy and Norrey girl came together. With Jon like to be overlord over a number of second sons once The Gift was populated, Ethan saw it fit for him to acquaint himself with the lordlings he would one day rule. After their return from the northern mountains, Ethan took him on a progress through the Glover lands introducing Jon to their vassals. 

“I met Brandon once when Lord Stark visited Deepwood Motte,” he told the boy wistfully. “And we became inseparable. A good lord should get to know his men, noble and not.”

After that trip, Ethan and Galbart teased Jon senseless about a daughter of Lord Forrester who grew hot on him. 

“Say the word,” Ethan laughed, “and we will seek her hand in marriage for you.” 

The boy reddened and lowered his gaze. 

Sometimes when she watched the two of them together, she wondered whether he felt a sense of loss whenever he saw Lyanna Stark’s boy, Lord Hornwood’s son, or their nephew and niece - the children of their household. When they married he swore that he would never lie with a woman who was not her. 

“I am not him,” he told her. The ‘ _ him’  _ required no name. He knew Rhaegar’s quest for the three heads of his dragon had destroyed the lives of so many. “My brothers are my heirs,” he said all those years ago when they were at Sunspear and he would repeat it to her over the years whenever she asked whether he regretted never having a child of his own. Yet, when she watched the way happiness radiated from him when he taught Larence something new or imparted some wisdom to Jon, she could not help but feel dispirited for not giving him a child - a Glover from his loins rather than from his brothers’.

Her husband was her shelter. She just hoped he would still feel the same about her when she shared the news about her son. 

She turned to the unfinished tunic she was sewing for Ethan. 

She had just finished embroidering the red sun and golden spear of her home next to the silver fist of House Glover when she heard the drums. They had been introduced centuries ago to warn of Ironborn raids. But as those reduced in frequency the castle guards began to use them to warn of all incoming parties who were not from Deepwood Motte. Elia tried to see who was coming but could not see beyond the castle walls. Dark brooding clouds hung over the hills like a harbinger of gloom. She suppressed a shiver as a dark sense of foreboding came over her. Someone knocked on the door.

“Enter,” she called out, putting her needle and the tunic down. 

It was Larence. Judging from the pink in his cheeks and his pants she could tell he’d run here. 

“What is it, dear?” 

He moved his golden hair from his eyes. “They carry Stark banners, princess. Lord Glover thought you might want to welcome them too.” 

She followed the boy out of the room all the while wondering why Winterfell had sent someone to Deepwood Motte.  _ Perhaps Robb missed his brother. Perhaps he brought Bran.  _ Jon had been over the moon with joy when the news that Bran had woken first arrived and given how much the Stark children loved him too Elia wouldn’t at all be surprised if they made the three hundred mile journey just to see each other again. The thought made Elia smile despite the heavy feeling in her chest. 

They passed the stables and the pen. They crossed the bailey, went past the forge and the kitchens. Stark men sat outside warming themselves with mulled mead. Jon’s wolf stood outside the doors of the longhall as if he were awaiting her. He fell into step with her the moment she reached him, rubbing himself against her like a newborn puppy might. For a wild wolf already the size of a foal, Ghost was one of the most temperate animals Elia had ever seen. Her husband sat at a table at the front of the hall with his brothers. But instead of the auburn hair of the Stark boys she was met with brown hair.  _ Jory?  _ She didn’t manage to so much as exchange a smile with him when she gasped.

“Jory?” She shook with shock. Jory lost his arm. She looked up to her husband. His face was as hard as stone. She turned back to Jory. “Oh, Jory, what happened?” She had first met the Captain of Ned Stark’s household guard on the day Rhaenys had died and had been in his company from King’s Landing to Storm’s End in the aftermath of the fall of King’s Landing. Given her closeness with his father, she had gotten to know Martyn Cassel’s son well over the years. 

“The Kingslayer,” he replied, each syllable dripped in disgust. 

“Jaime Lannister?” 

“Aye.” 

“Why?” She turned her head to look at her husband again. As hard with concern as his face was, his eyes softened at her when they met hers. 

“Lady Stark took the Imp hostage,” Jory explained. “And the Kingslayer attacked us in the streets as revenge for his brother. Heward and Wyl died and I-“ He raised his severed arm. Everything below his elbow on his left arm was gone. 

None of this made sense to Elia.  _ Why would Catelyn Stark take the Imp?  _ Even as a million questions scurried through her mind like restless mice, “And Lord Stark?” she queried doubtfully, unsure of whether she was ready to hear the answer. 

Jon entered the hall then, running. He’d no doubt heard something from the Stark retainers outside. 

“My father....what happened to my father?” 

Jory turned completely to him. “He was unconscious when I left.”

Colour drained from Jon’s face. Elia’s feet moved to stand beside him. 

“And now?” she prompted, placing a hand on the boy’s back.

“A raven got to Winterfell before me. My lord is awake now. The maesters say his leg will heal,” he said with a faint smile that disappeared into a glower. “And when it does he will exact justice on the Kingslayer.” 

Elia looked at Jon as Jory spoke. He stood there clenching and unclenching his fists. Tears glistened in his eyes but his jaw was set in fury. 

“His leg?” Elia asked.

“Lord Stark’s leg was shattered in the fight when his horse fell upon it. I...didn’t make it in time.” 

“Why wasn’t I told?” Jon shouted. “He’s my father too!”

“The raven only preceded me by a day, Jon.”

“I take it Jaime is dead?” Even if she knew the average man could not best the man Arthur had once knighted, Robert Baratheon, as much as she despised him, would not let live a man who harmed Ned Stark.  _ Even Jaime would not survive such a thing,  _ she thought. Ned Stark was not the beleaguered Aerys. Nor was Robert to let such a slight go.

“Nay, princess,” Jory said with a sigh that betrayed disappointment more than sadness. “He is said to have fled for Casterly Rock. He and his father are raising an army.” 

“Jory.” Her husband spoke for the first time. “Why don’t you start from the beginning? Why did Lady Stark seize the Imp?”

So he did. And with every word, fresh terror reared up within her. An assassin armed with a dagger belonging to Tyrion Lannister tried to kill little Bran Stark. Catelyn fought him off.  _ As only a mother would.  _

A sharp pain shot up Elia’s chest. In the distance she heard a gasp, saw a ball of black fur. The kitten.  _ Oops.  _ Rhaenys clapped a hand against her mouth. Amory Lorch walked toward Rhaegar’s bed. _ ‘Rhaenys run now!’  _ Elia stumbled back. She outstretched an arm to her side to regain her balance. Her husband was there. She felt him place a hand under her elbow to hold her up. She sat down. She retched. Ethan started whispering in her ear. 

“You’re safe, love. It will pass, I promise.” 

She felt something warm and wet on her face.  _ Ghost.  _ The wolf was licking off her tears, nuzzling against her, whining low, comforting her as if he could feel her pain. 

Beyond him, Jon shouted, demanding with heat to know whether his brother had come to harm, and why he had not been informed. Faintly over the booming in her ears she heard Jory explain that Catelyn Stark had sworn the few who knew to secrecy. 

“I’m not a stranger! Bran is my brother! I should have been told!!”

Elia sat there watching them in a daze. Her baby girl faded. Her eyes released the burdens of her heart and mind in tears that overflowed from her mind. And Ghost licked them all. 

Galbart and Robbett asked where the Imp was now. From the snippets she heard, Winterfell had no news of his or Catelyn’s whereabouts. Jory’s uncle, Ser Rodrik, was missing with her. 

Minutes later...hours maybe, Elia could not say, the thundering in her heart began to fade with each breath until she could formulate more than a few panicked words. Ghost’s head was on her lap. Absent-mindedly she began to scratch him between the ears. 

Jon turned to Ethan. Resolute. “My lord. I must return home. My brothers need me.”

Before Ethan could reply, Jory spoke. “That is why I am here.”

“I’m ready,” Jon declared. “Let’s go. I don’t need much.”

“We  _ will _ return to Winterfell,” said Jory. “And from there 

the Kingsroad south to Moat Cailin.”

“We are at war,” Ethan confirmed, for no one in particular.

“Not yet. But it was my lord’s intention before the Lannister’s fell upon us to instruct you, my lord, to send a hundred men to man Moat Cailin. Lord Tallhart is to provide another hundred. Cayn rode for Torrhen’s Square to deliver his instructions when I left for here.”

“Two hundred determined archers can push back any army Tywin Lannister sends there. I will need at least a day or two to prepare my men.”

“If only we were protecting ourselves from Tywin Lannister alone,” commiserated Jory. 

Ethan furrowed his brow in confusion. Galbart tilted his head to consider Jory closely and Robett shot a look of questioning at his oldest brother. 

“Who else?” It was Jon who spoke.

“The king.”

Terror streaked through Elia. Ghost raised his head to look up at her. 

“Why would we protect ourselves from the King?”

Jory’s eyes met Elia’s. Dread twisted in her gut. 

“The eunuch, Varys-“

Elia knew. Somehow she knew what was coming and panic gripped her throat, stealing her voice when she needed to speak most. “..Brought whispers to His Grace about a Targaryen in Westeros.”

Elia felt Ethan tense beside her. Rhaegar’s son stood in front of them. Her own belly cramped in horror, undesiring to know  _ which  _ of Rhaegar’s boys Varys spoke of. She could not even raise her eyes to look at Jon. Yet in her heart of hearts she knew. If it were Jon, Ned would have sent Martyn Cassel who was there the day Lyanna died. He would not send his son. In fact, conscious or not, the Starks would have returned North post-haste. Her mouth ran dry.  _ My son.  _

“Is it the boy Viserys?” Robett queried. 

“Viserys, according to Varys, is dead.”

“Who then?” Robett laughed into his mead. “Has Rhaegar risen from his grave? I can’t say my brother will be too happy about that.”

“Not Rhaegar. His son...The king wanted the boy killed...along with his uncles and mother and my lord would not stand for that. So he resigned. We planned to leave for Winterfell the next morning when the Kingslayer attacked us.”

The room began to spin. Ghost rubbed his nose against her middle but that did little to quell the terror that surged through her, choking her like a pebble lodged itself in her throat.  _ Now I am lost. Two days. I only wanted two more days.  _

“The Spider is nothing short of a charlatan who brings nothing but false whispers,” Ethan Glover spat. “He does nothing but bring the end of good men.” The fury radiated off him. The first time she had ever seen him was the day he screamed and fought until they beat him unconscious. That day, he watched the man he loved as a brother choke to death as his own father cooked in front of him. That day, Varys stood beside King Scab. Whispering. “His Grace would do well not to heed him.”

“Be that as it may. My lord had plans to hide Princess Elia in Greywater Watch and has asked Prince Doran to block the Prince’s Pass and the Boneway.”

“Why would we need to hide Elia?” asked Galbart, the quieter and more observant of Ethan’s two brothers.

“You said his mother.” Ethan stood abruptly. 

Her bones turned to water. 

“Has the eunuch lost his senses? He was there the day we...they were both there-“ He ran angry hands through his hair, pacing away from her and back. “What is he playing at?”

“What exactly are these whispers?” Galbart asked.

Jory spoke of choice whispers of Aegon being swapped for another child, of Ashara and Jon Connington raising Aegon, and of Oberyn and Doran protecting him. 

Jon sat beside her. “Princess Elia…” His wolf was nudging her out of her daze. 

“We all know the boy,” Jory said. “As Oberyn’s bastard.”

Robett laughed out loud. “Oh, don’t be silly.”

“I need to speak with my husband.” Elia finally found her voice. The entire scheme stank of her brothers. No doubt Oberyn, in his impatience, sought to force Ned Stark’s hand to take a stand, any stand. And Doran whose idea it indubitably was to present an incomplete but sufficient picture wanted to test what Ned Stark’s next move would be. Ashara and Jon Connington were not the only people who raised her son. Jory made no mention of Arthur or Os, or Ser Gerold, the men Ned Stark allegedly killed. She was sure that was intentional too. To mention them would make the entire scheme either seem false for it would be dismissed as nothing more than the story of a ghost raised by ghosts or it would expose Ned for a liar. Doran would not have the honour of the man who saved her besmirched. She pictured him sitting in front of his cyvasse board, cautiously considering where to move each piece on his board. Were her home not blown away with the storm they sent, Elia might have appreciated her brothers’ ploy. With his resignation, Ned Stark passed their test. Though it was no direct promise for support, he confirmed with his resignation that he would not stand to watch Robert destroy them. And he went one step further, when he committed treason by warning Doran to close off the Boneway and the Prince’s Pass. Just as the North had Moat Cailin, Dorne had those two pathways. Doran had ensured he learnt from the lessons of those the Young Dragon had once conquered.  _ Could they not have waited a while longer? _

Ethan stared at her with muted realisation, his eyes widening at her non-denial. As his brothers and Jory and Jon began to file out, Elia looked at each one.

Ethan turned his head away from her. Panic gripped her throat. But he didn’t leave the hall. She turned to his brothers. Robett pressed his lips together but could not meet her eyes. Galbart sent her a pitiful smile. No doubt he meant it to comfort her but she only grew more frantic with fear, chasing her husband’s eyes across the hall. Jory smiled knowingly, sadly. As did Jon. Ghost left with his master.

She turned back to her husband and saw a hundred different feelings flit around his eyes. 

“Tell me the Spider is lying, Elia,” he mumbled. “Tell me my suspicions are wrong.” He stepped out of her reach when she moved to touch him. “Tell me you didn’t start our marriage on a lie.”

“It isn’t what you think-”

“Then tell me.” 

So she started from the beginning: when King Scab sent off Uncle Lewyn. She told him of the warning to hide Aegon, of the months she spent not knowing if her son made it out alive. She told him how initially she only sought respite from Robert who was going to marry her to his brother but that over the years she had not loved a man more. 

“And yet you lied to me,” he interjected. “All of you - your brothers, your son, your nieces, but most of all you. The woman I’ve been married to for nearly half my life.”

“I was going to tell you...when we left.”

He scoffed bitterly. “Should that comfort me? That you would tell me after sixteen years of marriage?”

“At first I was too scared to say anything, Ethan. And then I was afraid as the years went on, of the moment I told you the truth. I thought you would no longer care for me.”

“And do you think I care for you now?” 

Her tears seemed to scald her cheeks until she struggled to see him through the film they created. “On one hand there was you, my husband. The one man I have ever truly loved. On the other, my child. I saw what they would do to him had news of him ever broke. They had done it to that innocent child, they had done it to my daughter, Ethan. I couldn’t save my Rhaenys but I had a chance to save my boy. I could not risk his life.”

“And I would harm him? Is that it?”

“No. I...I didn’t tell you so you wouldn’t have to choose. But I couldn’t hide it any longer. I was going to tell you.”

“You did it for me. Hah!” There was no mirth in his laughter. He ran his fingers through his hair, irritably.

“I didn’t want to force you to choose between your lord and I. As hard as it would be, you would follow Ned Stark to the end of the world, even if it was to fight my son for Robert.”

“So now Ned is your enemy?”

“No, never!” Even if the day came when Eddard Stark stood across from her on the battlefield, she would never consider him an enemy, not after everything they had been through. “Ned Stark had to protect Jon. He did not owe my son the same allegiance and I did not know what to do. Especially not once he had reconciled with the man who celebrated the deaths of my children. You were there that day. You saw how Robert laughed and yet Ned returned to him. And you are Ned Stark’s man before you are mine. What was I to think?” 

“Ned would never allow harm to come to your child.”

“Nor would he allow him to reclaim what is his. You may love Robert, Ned may too, but there is only one man I hate more in this world than him. Robert didn’t even let me bury my daughter and I have been robbed of seventeen years with my son. Aegon has had to grow up in hiding for fear of the king you and Ned would fight for, did fight for. What was I to do?”

He moved closer to her. And in a low voice said, “Ned trusted you with Lyanna’s boy. He resigned to save your son and stood against his king, he committed treason to protect your child and all this time you lied to him...to me. And all for what? So you could ready your son for a throne his father lost?” He took a step back from her, surveying her with a bitter smile. “So  _ that’s  _ where you sent them...the Kingsguard. From one son of Rhaegar to their would-be-king. Of course with teachers like that, your son would be a master swordsman. What did you seek up here? Hmm?” She opened her mouth but before a sound escaped her he said, “Tell you what, don’t tell me. Whatever it was I should have known to expect deceit when I married a woman like you.”

The words hurt more than a strike to her face. “A woman like me?”

“A would-be-queen who never stopped playing the game of thrones. That’s all your type do isn’t it? Distrust, betray, deceive. Tell me this,  _ princess _ , was it all a lie? Every time you forced yourself to lie with a man who you did not trust, did you regret it? Hmm? Did you miss Dorne? Or King’s Landing? Did you long instead for a man with the riches that would make your son king? Or did you just wish for a man who you did not have to lie to...perhaps a man not so stupid.”

“It’s not like that-“

“What is it then?” He asked bitterly. “You,  _ Princess _ Elia Martell, have lied to me all this time. And none more so than when your son was under my roof and you introduced him to me as your nephew. Perhaps you should have married someone you trusted and me someone who afforded me that courtesy. I would rather have-“ He said no more, only pushing her away when she reached for him.

“You would rather what?” she questioned tearily. He gave her no response, turning away from her completely to face the raging hearth. “You would rather a wife who would never lie to you. One who would give you children...one worthy of your trust,” she finished for him, biting down the sob that threatened to break her body apart. If he plunged his hand into her chest with his unsaid words and ripped out her heart, it could not hurt more. The worst part of it was he had every right. 

“Prepare your things, Princess Elia,” he said. “We set off the day after tomorrow.”

She reeled back from his use of her title, gripped the nearest table and dragged air into her lungs. It never seemed to be enough. 

In a daze she returned to the room she had shared with her husband.

She dropped down, resting her chin against her knees just as she did as a child. Except this time Oberyn wasn’t there to sit beside her. She was truly alone. 

She fell asleep in that position. She dreamt and cried and dreamt some more of their hut. They were there in her dream. They sat in front of the fire holding hands, fell asleep and awoke with their fingers still entwined. They laughed over silly jokes and she watched him chop logs for their fire in front of their dwelling and found herself filled with a feeling so full she feared she might burst with it. And just as she thought that, the hut faded and so too did Etha. She awoke reeling. She thought she heard someone in the dark room with her.

“Ethan?” she said quietly, got no answer, and succumbed to her tears. 

A long while later, ever so slowly she saw the door open and Ethan’s shape walk out. He didn’t say a word to her, nor did he at any point the next day. He busied himself with ordering pack horses readied, reassigning duties in his absence and ignoring her completely. 

She explained herself to his brothers. Robett gave her a kind ear. With children of their own, he and his wife, it seemed, tried to understand her. Galbart listened too. But he also reminded her of how she wounded his brother and them all. “We took you for one of our own,” he commiserated.

But it was Jon who surprised her most. He’d known about Aegon ever since Winterfell and had never said a word. “I understand why you did what you did,” he told her, after assuring her that no one other than he and Arya knew. That night, she tried hard not to sob against the child she had comforted just days after he was born, all while wondering when he had grown up to be the one offering her his shoulder for comfort. She cupped his cheek and kissed his brow.  _ The son I never had. _

He kept talking to her well after supper, of his own worries, his fears for Ned Stark in the south and for Arya who he’d learnt had already fallen foul of Cersei Lannister and her bastard. Elia tried to comfort him in turn.

“Jory said they hunted her down but he found her before they could. Anything could have happened to her,” he said sadly. “She would have been scared. And now both Arya and Sansa are alone without their wolves among people who would attack my father in the street and kill his men…” 

Two days later, they left just as Ethan promised. They even rode for the Wolfswood...but not for their hut. They were marching first for Winterfell, then the Kingsroad and perhaps war. Ethan kept his back to her the entire journey, choosing to ride at the head of his men. She had never wanted to hear his roaring laugh more in her life but that, it seemed, would never be directed at her again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for taking so long to update (I’ve never taken this long to write a chapter without intending to take a break. I know it’s only been a week but you know lol) The day job has been quite busy. 
> 
> I found it really hard to write this chapter & I’m not sure I’ve got it perfect. I like writing angst but I’m not good at conflict and in any case, it’s been kind of hard to feel angsty with Mr Cheeto having public breakdowns daily. Perhaps I’ll rewrite this chapter at some point but I thought I’d share what I’ve got so far. 
> 
> As for Varys stirring the pot...we now know what he was playing at. It looks as if the Martell brothers with their differing natures got their orange almost ripe (and they would have gotten away with it if they didn’t burn Elia in the process). 
> 
> There are probably easier routes to Moat Cailin than going east then south but just go with me okay lmao. 
> 
> My heart hurts for Ethan and Elia :( I could have written a book based on this chapter alone but I need to focus haha.
> 
> The next chapter is one I’ve been excited about ever since I wrote Littlefinger...I get to write Cersei lmao. Updates may be slow this month but I should have more spare time next month. 
> 
> As always, thank you for reading!


	29. Cersei

**Cersei:**

He had the gall to _ summon _ her.  _ Come alone,  _ he said. To the queen. She was Cersei Lannister, Light of the West, and she  _ would  _ see him to hear what he had to say but on her own terms. The Starks had gotten much too big for their boots in recent months. First that daughter of his attacked Joff with her wolf, and then her bitch mother seized Tyrion - the Imp for whom Cersei had never cared. But he was a Lannister and that made him a cut above the rest of the rabble Robert had surrounded himself with. 

Then Ned Stark had the audacity to send men after Father’s in the Riverlands as if his wife had not started things. And as if that wasn’t enough, he threatened Lord Tywin Lannister, he of the Rains of Castamere, with the wrath of Robert, the oaf who had not so much done anything worthy of note since the Greyjoy rebellion.  _ “Lord Beric rides beneath the king’s own banner,”  _ he told Pycelle. “ _ If Lord Tywin attempts to interfere with the king’s justice, he will have Robert to answer to. The only thing his Grace enjoys more than hunting is making war on lords who defy him.” _

Father in turn required Cersei to solve the problem of Ned Stark as if Robert would listen to her. He made the tiresome man Hand of the King once again, struck Cersei hard in the face and rode off to ignore the problems they faced. Like the rumour of a certain...ghost...or ghosts. Cersei herself did not believe a word of it, it was too fanciful a prospect. The queen had paid no attention to the boy in Winterfell but Robert seemed infuriated by the prospect nonetheless. It had been a while since the news arrived and they had heard nothing since. The queen told herself she would not give it any further thought.Tywin Lannister, the golden lion of the Rock, did not leave any work unfinished and if the news were true, the pitiful Elia Martell would not have been so forlorn if her own son was in Winterfell with them.

If the madness had not caused Aerys to refuse Lord Tywin Lannister’s own trueborn daughter as wife to his son, the boy may have been Cersei’s and unlike the black-eyed, flat-chested Dornishwoman Rhaegar took to wife, she would have kept him alive. A lioness did not allow anyone to harm her cubs. So if by some miracle this boy was truly Rhaegar’s she would dispose of him just as Jaime did of his grandfather and her father had seen to his demise. Yes, that she would do. 

Cersei was pouring herself some wine, a gift from the Lord of the Arbor whose sons she had at court, when a page came to inform her that the eunuch was outside. 

“Let him in,” the queen said. She moved behind the screen in her room. Her face was still bruised from where Robert had struck her and the queen would not be seen as weak by anyone. She was Queen Cersei Lannister, trueborn daughter of Tywin Lannister and her father with teats. Just as her father cowed men, so too would she.  _ Though this one is no man at all...I’m as much a man as him,  _ she thought, looking down at her riding leathers.  _ Neither of us have balls.  _

“Your Grace,” he said airily, bowing low, with both his hands tucked into his voluminous sleeves. She saw him through the meshing on the screen. Today he was adorned in rich silk and velvet and as ever the soft slippers that made no noise. 

“What brings you here?” she asked, bored already. 

“May I sit?” He motioned at the chair opposite. 

“Please.” 

“I come with concerning news, my queen. My little birds come to me with new whispers…There is no pleasant way for me to say this, Your Grace.” He paused dramatically. “I am here because it is my role to see to the stability of the realm, to know of what the king... _ and…”  _ He waved a hand in her direction. “The queen’s enemies plan. I am your sworn servant, you and the king’s and I would not be doing my job unless I came to you with this news.” 

“Yes...what is this news?”

“It is Lord Renly, Your Grace. I hear he has recently finished talks with Lord Mace Tyrell. Given his troubles with you...he believes that he would better consolidate his position by introducing a new mistress to His Grace, one who he hopes His Grace would replace you with. I believe it is his and Lord Tyrell’s intention that should this ploy succeed, the Tyrells would replace the Lannister influence in court. Lord Mace, I hear, is willing to pay off the Crown’s debts to Lord Tywin as part of this partnership.” 

The queen grabbed her chalice tighter, until her knuckles turned white. Cersei had never been able to stand Robert’s brothers. Stannis was hiding in Dragonstone, no doubt plotting to bring her down with the information Jon Arryn had been investigating and Renly it seemed was plotting too.

“Who is the girl?” 

“Lord Mace Tyrell’s only daughter, Your Grace. Margaery Tyrell. The girl is said to resemble Lyanna Stark.”

The wolf-girl’s name still irritated the queen. She was dead and buried while Cersei was queen. She had no reason to bristle at the sound of her name and yet she did. “Yes...well…” Cersei said sardonically, “there seem to be many Lyanna Starks these days.” The queen had never quite understood the appeal of the girl who captured the hearts of both Robert and Rhaegar. Uncle Kevan had called her a wild boyish thing of no consequence. If she looked anything at all like Ned Stark’s little animal daughter, she must have been a witch to have so bewitched both men. Cersei had seen no redeeming quality in her at all. She had talked the oaf out of trying to marry Joff to the animal. At least the other one was easy on the eyes. 

“My birds tell me Renly presented her portrait to Ned Stark to ask if she did indeed resemble his late sister.” The eunuch leaned forward, “No doubt, he hoped she did, given the King’s love for the dead Stark girl. She does not, according to our good Hand.” 

“And is the girl at court yet?” 

“No, Your Grace, not yet. I hear Renly would like to invite her to court for the celebrations of His Grace’s seventeenth year as king in a month’s time. I believe he plans to ride for Highgarden upon the king’s return from his hunting trip.” 

An idea began to form in the queen’s head - one her father would be quite proud of. Cersei twirled the chalice by the stem and watched the wine swirl. She was the lion’s daughter and to a lion, a stag was only prey, as Renly and Robert too would soon learn.

The queen could not hide her smile. “Thank you, Varys,” Cersei said. “Thank you for bringing this news to me,” she reiterated. The news had emboldened her to do something she should have done years ago. She smiled to herself again and sipped the rest of her wine. She knew the eunuch whispered to everyone to try and convince them that they would be helpless without him, but this one time, she would let him believe he had her gratitude. In this one matter he truly did.

“Have my son summoned,” Cersei ordered. “Now remember, he is to be brought back by hook or by crook. You will give this note to Sandor Clegane. And you, dear cousin, you know what you must do. The man abuses me. Look at my face.” She raised his hand to touch her cheek. “He would kill me if no one stopped him. You and Tyrek are all the kin I have here. Jaime would not allow him to get away with this, nor would my father...or yours. Oh Lancel, you are all I have.” She turned to hand him the wineskin. “If he...must come back, I would rather he was not here to beat me, dear cousin. This here is strongwine. Make sure the king drinks as much of it as possible. He can only return here too drunk to hit me…”  _ Or if things go the way I wish, dead.  _ Cersei smiled tearily once more at her uncle Kevan’s son and kissed him on both cheeks, and let the third linger on the corner of his lips. She had the strongwine prepared to be more potent than Robert was used to. If her fortune was good he would lose his life before he returned...and if he did return, in a stupor, Cersei would see to his end herself. 

_ Renly and the Tyrells could not introduce a new queen if there was no king to marry her.  _ The queen laughed again and raised the chalice to her lips.

The sun had already begun to set when she finally made it to the godswood. Alone, as he requested, if only to see what he wanted. The man was still there even though she made him wait hours. 

She drew back the hood of her cloak. When she did, he flinched at the look of her bruise.  _ Look well, Lord Stark, this is what your king did in your defence.  _ He began to talk to her about the  _ truth  _ Jon Arryn died for but could not take his eyes off the yellow bruise on her face. He touched her cheek gently. 

“Has he done this before?” 

“Once or twice.” She moved away from his hand. She wanted no kindness nor pity from him. “Never on the face before. Jaime would have killed him, even if it meant his own life.” Cersei looked down her nose at him. “My brother is worth a hundred of your friend.”

“Your brother?” he said with a laugh. “Or your lover?” 

“Both.” Cersei saw no need to flinch from the truth. She would kill Robert one way or another and who was left to defy her? This pitiful lame-legged man? “Since we were children together. And why not? The Targaryens wed brother to sister for three hundred years, to keep the bloodlines pure. And Jaime and I are more than brother and sister. We are one person in two bodies. We shared a womb together. He came into this world holding my foot, our old maester said. When he is in me, I feel … whole.” She couldn’t help a smile flit over her lips. 

“My son Bran …” 

“He saw us. You love your children, do you not?” 

“With all my heart.”

“No less do I love mine,” she told him. 

He spoke to her of dry tales of Robert being a man any maiden would have loved as if he was something special. Cersei unburdened herself, she saw no need to fear a dead man. She told him what Robert was truly like, of how Robert first whispered Lyanna’s name on top of her on their wedding night. 

The man had the audacity to say, “I do not know which of you I pity most.” 

Cersei couldn’t stifle a laugh. “Save your pity for yourself, Lord Stark. I want none of it.” 

“You know what I must do,” he said. 

“Must?” She put her hand on his leg, just above the knee. “A true man does what he will, not what he must,” she reminded him. Her fingers brushed lightly against his thigh. Ned Stark was not an ugly man. She might even find lying with him pleasurable, at least while Jaime was out of town. She would of course have to try and resolve things between them...or she would have to kill him when her father and brother were no longer so preoccupied. She leaned into him. “The realm needs a strong Hand. Joff is still only five-and-ten and will need you. No one wants war again, least of all me.”  _ Not until Jaime and Father return.  _ She cupped his cheek, and touched his hair. ““If friends can turn to enemies, enemies can become friends. Your wife is a thousand leagues away, and my brother has fled. Be kind to me, Ned. I swear to you, you shall never regret it.”

“Did you make the same offer to Jon Arryn?” 

She slapped him. 

“I shall wear that as a badge of honor,” he said, mocking her. 

“Honour,” she spat. “How dare you play the noble lord with me! What do you take me for? You’ve a bastard of your own, I’ve seen him. Who was the mother, I wonder? Some Dornish peasant you raped while her holdfast burned? A whore? Or was it the grieving sister, the Lady Ashara? She threw herself into the sea, I’m told. Why was that? For the brother you slew, or the child you stole? Or did you truly hide her away? Am I to believe the whispers I hear of her resurrection? Did you resign to protect your mistress? Tell me, my honourable Lord Eddard, how are you any different from Robert, or me, or Jaime?”

““For a start, I do not kill children. You would do well to listen, my lady. I shall say this only once. When the king returns from his hunt, I intend to lay the truth before him. You must be gone by then. You and your children, all three, and not to Casterly Rock. If I were you, I should take ship for the Free Cities or even farther, to the Summer Isles or the Port of Ibben. As far as the winds blow.” 

“Exile. A bitter cup to drink from.” 

“A sweeter cup than your father served Rhaegar’s children,” Ned said, “and kinder than you deserve. Your father and your brothers would do well to go with you. Lord Tywin’s gold will buy you comfort and hire swords to keep you safe. You shall need them. I promise you, no matter where you flee, Robert’s wrath will follow you, to the back of beyond if need be.” 

The queen stood. “And what of my wrath, Lord Stark?”  _ In a coat of gold or a coat of red…  _ “You should have taken the realm for yourself,” she told him, recalling the story Jaime had once told her of how Ned Stark could have taken the throne for himself when King’s Landing fell. Instead he busied himself with the Dornish woman and her dead children. “Such a sad mistake,” the queen said. 

“I have made more mistakes than you can possibly imagine,” he replied, “but that was not one of them.” 

“Oh, but it was, my lord,” the queen insisted. “When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. There is no middle ground.”  _ And Cersei Lannister would win.  _ She turned up her hood to hide her bruised face and left him there in the dark beneath the oak. He gazed up at the stars. 

Robert was brought back at death’s door, but not dead.  _ He should have been dead.  _ She sent more strongwine after her conversation with the Stark lord.  _ He should have succumbed.  _ Cersei sat at the end of his bed with frayed nerves. If Ned Stark told him the truth before he died, Cersei’s life would be that much harder. She might have to have them all killed. Robert, Renly,, Ned Stark...The problem was they had more men than she did. Her father had chosen a terrible time to begin amassing an army. She would have to think about what to do. 

She had refused to have Tommen and Myrcella brought in to see him. She would not have her children see the sorry sight but Joff insisted. 

She grew icy with panic when Robert asked for Ned Stark to be called.

“Oh, my love. You can see him later,” she smiled. “You need rest.” 

Renly Baratheon was in the room with them. How he stood the ugly smell of the wound she could not understand. She  _ had  _ to be there to prevent him from seeing Ned Stark. But the man would not be cowed. So she decided that she would not leave the room. She would be privy to everything said. Pycelle soaked bandages in wine and applied them over the wound. They turned black with blood. 

“Ned,” he whispered when the man hobbled in holding the shoulders of two of his men. Cersei’s eyes flitted between Robert and Eddard Stark. She barely heard their conversation, focusing more on planning a way out of these few hours for herself and her children. Robert spoke about having the boar fed at the feast following his death, Renly said some things, the queen paid that traitor no attention. 

“Now leave us. The lot of you. I need to speak with Ned,” Robert Baratheon said. 

“Robert, my sweet lord …” Cersei began. She moved his hair from his face.

“I said leave,” he bellowed. “What part of that don’t you understand, woman?”

The queen gathered her skirts and thus began her dread-filled hours. She had Joff secured in a hidden location inside the castle by two of her father’s men, Sandor Clegane and Ser Meryn Trant, who was more her creature than the king’s. If anything happened to her this night, Jaime and her father would see Joff crowned. These men would see him smuggled out. 

Cersei paced up and down her rooms and drank and drank and drank. None of it seemed to help.

Pycelle called upon her first. Robert was dead. Cersei would have to move quickly. 

Varys came to visit upon her next with the news of another death that cheered her up. It seemed her enemies were falling like flies. Stannis Baratheon had been attacked by a dog from his kennels a fortnight ago. 

“I hear he was found with his throat torn out and his face being eaten by the dog. A most gruesome death, Your Grace.”

“Yes. Most gruesome,” Cersei agreed, stifling a titter. The irony was not lost on her. A dog and a pig had brought the end of the fearsome Baratheon brothers. 

The reason they had not yet heard of his demise was apparently because the bothersome woman he married had fortified herself in Dragonstone and surrounded herself with the royal fleet her husband had pilfered. And she apparently allowed not a single raven to leave the castle. The Queen resisted the urge to laugh out loudly. Stannis had been her greatest worry. Unlike Ned Stark the man had no scruples. He also had no fear. Most men were cowed by the Lannister name. He was not one of them. 

“Who else knows of this news?”

“No one, Your Grace. I had a bird in Stannis’ household who had me informed.”

“You said no ravens were permitted to leave. I presume no men were either.”

“No ravens, Your Grace, and no men, but not no birds.” 

Cersei nodded. She didn’t care  _ how  _ he came about the news. Stannis was dead! 

His other news was not as exciting. Robert had named Ned Stark Lord Protector. She still had him to deal with. The idiot, however, insisted on making her job easier. Renly had offered him men but the Stark lord refused the aid. Renly could round up as many men as Cersei and could have held her back. 

“Your Grace, Lord Renly cannot leave,” Varys warned her. “If he does, he will ally himself with the Tyrells and make a claim for the throne when news of Stannis’ death becomes public. It cannot be hidden forever and we cannot afford a war, not now that Ser Jaime and Lord Tywin are preparing to go to war in the Riverlands.”

“How can he do that? Has the law changed without my knowledge? Joff is Robert’s heir, Tommen after him and Myrcella comes before any of Robert’s brothers.” 

“Your Grace, I hear he and Loras Tyrell plan to peddle an egregious lie that with the support of House Tyrell may give him an army to make a direct attack for us.”

“What is this lie?”

“Your Grace, he means to allege...that our princes and princess are not of the king’s seed. The only reason he has not said anything is because he feared Stannis would become King Robert’s heir and if anything happened to our king before he had other children...well Stannis would be king. That is why he had intended to introduce the Tyrell girl to our king, have her give him a child and then peddle this falsehood. The death of Stannis would clear the way for him to make his claim.”

“He would usurp his niece? The mouse in Dragonstone?”

“Lord Renly is well loved, Your Grace and lords would be more willing to see a knight like Renly take the throne than a girl of four-and-ten. We must stop him before he leaves tonight. Once he is out of King’s Landing, we cannot stop the storm he will unleash.”

Cersei had a dozen knights, two of whom were protecting Joff, and another three protecting Myrcella and Tommen. She also had a hundred men at arms, all loyal to her but not as well-trained as Renly’s men, at least half of whom were knights. Her work was hard. She had to secure her children, beat back Ned Stark’s men -he only had around thirty, while also having to secure the castle, beat Renly and take the throne back in the morning with just those one hundred men. Cersei paced up and down her room asking herself what her father would do...what Jaime would do. She was thinking about how she would do all this when Littlefinger visited upon her. 

He sat opposite her without seeking permission and watched her for a few moments. He was clad in a blue velvet tunic with puffed sleeves. His silvery cape was patterned with mockingbirds.  _ A man who would create his own sigil.  _

“What brings you here?” Cersei asked impatiently. 

“I…” he flicked some dirt from between his nails, “came here to share my condolences. Our good king is gone.”  _ So the news already travelled.  _

“Yes.” 

“I’ve just had an interesting middle of the night meeting with Lord Stark…”

“Yes?” 

He paused to hold her gaze. “You are aware he has been named Lord Protector.”

“I am.”

“And regent.”

“Yes.” 

“He means to crown Lord Stannis because...of what he calls ‘ _ the truth which Jon Arryn died for’.” _

“And what truth is that?” 

He smiled knowingly at her. Cersei had never seen a face she wanted to choke more. “He will say that Prince Joffrey is illegitimate and not King Robert’s heir.”

The queen had lost count of the number of times she had to repress the desire to laugh.  _ He can’t crown a dead king  _ but the Queen did not feel like informing Littlefinger of this fact, not until she knew what he wanted. 

“I told him the smart thing to do would be to crown Prince Joffrey, be his regent, a short regency of course, and retire back to that waste of his up north. He spoke of right and wrong, of his men that Ser Jaime killed, of Jon Arryn...and his son. He seems to be under the presumption that House Lannister tried to kill his son.”

“As does his wife.”

“How preposterous.” 

“What do you want, Littlefinger? Why tell me all this?”

“You are my queen of course,” he said with not a hint of sincerity in his voice. “And I would see Lord Stark’s end.”

“Do you still hold a torch for his wife?” The queen considered him as she took a sip of her wine. Perhaps she would hold Lord Paxter’s twins a little while longer if he would send her such vintages. “ I’ve heard about all your boasts of fucking her. Do you plan to return to her heat?”

He didn’t bat an eye and simply smiled. “No, Your Grace. I wish to see Ned Stark fall because he would give us Stannis as king. And that works well for neither of us.”

“Well…” she smiled, “What do you propose we do about it?” 

“Well...for now nothing. Ned Stark has bought us the City Watch. He gave me six thousand gold pieces to buy the two thousand men of the City Watch. Half would have sufficed but why take chances? Tomorrow when the Stark lord proclaims one king and you proclaim another...well… it will be strength that speaks. May I?” He motioned at the wine glass on the desk.

Cersei stood up to pour it for him. It would be best if he thought he was the one doing her a favour. His efforts were for naught of course, Stannis couldn’t be crowned... _ but Renly could.  _

“I thank you, Lord Baelish,” she said, raising her glass. “As you know, A Lannister always pays their debts.”  _ Even me.  _ “You will be handsomely repaid for this service but I have need of five hundred of those men this very night.”

“For what, Your Grace.” 

“To hunt a stag.” 

The day dawned grey and grim.  _ A grey day for Lord Stark,  _ the queen thought as she fixed the golden lion on her Joff’s chest. Below, her men-at-arms filled the air with the sound of swords. The queen fixed the crown on her new king’s head and gave him words of wisdom. She was Cersei Lannister, Daughter of the Rock and mother to a king. She had done it, just as Father said she would and she needed neither Rhaegar nor Robert for it. Her boy was a pure-blooded Lannister. 

Ser Arys Oakheart told her that Sansa Stark was outside to see her. Cersei had no time for the girl but something inside her told her to allow her in. By the end of the conversation, Cersei was ever so glad to have done so. The girl was hopelessly in love, and a dolt. A terrible combination in a person but a boon for Cersei, even more so than seeing the end of her enemies in a night...well all but the one who remained now. The girl’s father. 

“Have her await me in the King’s solar, please,” the queen said. She would take that for herself.

When the queen finally made it in, the girl fixed her posture to curtsy deeply. “Your Grace…” she began shyly, looking up at Cersei from between her lashes. “I am here to bid you farewell. My-”

“Farewell, sweet one?” Cersei moved to fix the girl’s necklace. “Wherever are you going?” 

“It’s my father, Your Grace. He would have us return to Winterfell. He wants to break my betrothal to Prince Joffrey and he wouldn’t even give me leave to say farewell but he let Arya take her stupid dancing teacher and he even let her have a final lesson with him but I couldn’t come and see you and-“

“Dancing teacher?” 

“My sister is hopeless at everything, Your Grace. My father thought she might take to dancing.” 

“Ah,” Cersei smiled before she asked about where these lessons took place and when...

“Oh, Your Grace.” The girl was crying now. “Your Grace, I love Joffrey and I love you and I don’t want to go back to Winterfell and Father will not listen to me and I-” she hiccuped as she spoke.

“Oh dear, dear,” Cersei said, passing her a handkerchief. “Why does your father want to break the betrothal?”

“He said it’s all been a mistake, Your Grace. That he’ll find me someone else. But I don’t want anyone else. I love Joff. I want to be his princess and give him lovely golden haired children and-” 

“There, there,” the queen comforted her. “Do you truly want to stay?” 

“Yes.” The girl looked at her with so much hope. “I will be so good, Your Grace. I promise to love the prince and give him everything. I promise I will be good-.” 

“Fine,” Cersei said. “I have grown to love you dear and would be ever so delighted to have you for a daughter. I will speak to your father.” Cersei moved a lock of her hair from her shoulder and to her back. The girl had taken to braiding her hair in a southron fashion so akin to Cersei’s. It seemed the girl had fashioned herself  _ after  _ Cersei. The difference between them, however, was that Cersei would have never betrayed her father to anyone else.  _ I may have for Rhaegar,  _ she thought.  _ But Joff is no Rhaegar and this girl is not me.  _

“When were you supposed to leave?” 

“Today, Your Grace, this evening.” 

“And your entire household would be going with you?” 

“Not all, Your Grace.” She then started naming those who would. The rest, it seemed, would be travelling by the Kingsroad.

Cersei smiled. “I assure you, you won’t be going anywhere, lovely one.”

“Oh, Your Grace!” the girl’s smile was blinding as she curtsied.

“Ser Arys,” Cersei called out. “Why don’t you take the beautiful Lady Sansa to the royal apartments in Maegor’s Holdfast. She is to stay there until further notice. Please...ensure no one knows where she is until her father and I speak. The lovely girl will soon be a princess of our realm.” 

The girl flushed preetilly. The queen had to admit she was beautiful even  _ if _ she had no brains.  _ I suppose that might work for her.  _

Whatever Ned Stark did now, Cersei held his heart in her hands. She could not get the other one now. Ned Stark had concentrated his men around the Tower of the Hand. But well.. The day had just dawned...and it would prove to be as long for the Stark as the night had been for the queen... _ just not as successful. _

“Have the small council summoned to the throne room,” Cersei ordered the king’s steward. “Have them know that their  _ king  _ demands their immediate presence.” The queen could afford one last glass of wine. She was already drunk off her victory but one more glass never harmed anyone. 

The queen ordered the Lannister men to wait inside the throne room and had the gold cloaks lined outside on the ramparts.  _ Let him believe he has won...that they hold the city for him.  _

Cersei Lannister, Light of the West, dressed like the queen she was. She would not wear drab black clothes to mourn a man she hated. She dressed that morning in a gown of sea-green silk, trimmed with Myrish lace as pale as foam. On her finger was a golden ring with an emerald the size of a pigeon’s egg. It had once belonged to her mother before Tyrion had killed her. On her head, she wore a matching tiara, a gift from Lord Tywin Lannister himself.  _ Look at me Father,  _ Cersei wanted to say.  _ Look at what I have achieved, alone, while all of you left me by myself. Look at what I have achieved.  _

“Have my poor good-brother’s body presented to Lord Stark on his way out,” she said. “Make sure he doesn’t miss it.” 

Joff sat upon the conqueror’s throne, looking ever so like her Jaime. Her golden lion. Her Tommen and Myrcella were also there, standing below their brother’s throne. Five knights of the Kingsguard, all but Jaime and Ser Barristan, stood at the base of the throne in a crescent. Cersei stood behind Sers Boros and Meryn. Twenty Lannister guardsmen including her dozen knights stood behind them. Their gold helms shone brighter than any other man’s in the room. 

Ned Stark came in with the rest of the small council. He made a pitiful sight leaning on Littlefinger for support for his bad leg - the very man who plotted his demise. An idiot if the queen had ever seen one. 

Her son, the king, stood to announce that he would be crowned within a fortnight and ordered the small council to see to the preparation of his coronation. He would also accept their fealty. 

The Stark lord presented his useless piece of paper. Cersei allowed him to make his show, she enjoyed watching him believe he had it all figured out. Varys handed her the letter, another man loyal to her. The queen smiled at him for being part of her show...for not announcing the deaths of Stannis and Renly. That was her role. 

She scanned the paper and scoffed. “Protector of the Realm,” she read. “Is this meant to be your shield, my lord? A piece of paper?” She ripped it in half, ripped the halves in quarters, and let the pieces flutter to the floor. 

“Those were the king’s words,” the old dolt Ser Barristan choked out.  _ I will have him replaced first.  _

“We have a new king now,” the queen informed him.. “Lord Eddard, when last we spoke, you gave me some counsel. Allow me to return the courtesy. Bend the knee, my lord. Bend the knee and swear fealty to my son, and we shall allow you to step down as Hand and live out your days in the grey waste you call home.” “

Would that I could. Your son has no claim to the throne he sits. Lord Stannis is Robert’s true heir.” 

“Liar!” Joffrey screamed, his face reddening. 

“Mother, what does he mean?” Princess Myrcella asked the queen plaintively. “Isn’t Joff the king now?” 

“Please, you condemn yourself with your own mouth, Lord Stark. My good brother, Stannis died a fortnight ago on Dragonstone. Apparently he was attacked by...his dog, was it Lord Varys?” 

“Yes, Your Grace.” 

The queen savoured the look of shock on his face, his and Littlefinger’s who had no real reason to give her his loyalty. Had he given those men to Renly...or Ned Stark well...it would have been a different story. But the queen paid Lord Janos Slynt another six thousand gold coins and the promise of a lordship the previous night to ensure that his loyalty was to her alone. 

“Your son has no right to that throne. And if Stannis is dead as you say-” 

Cersei could not listen any longer. “Ser Barristan, seize this traitor,” she ordered. “He has condemned himself by denying our king... _ your king.”  _

Ser Barristan hesitated and Cersei grew sure of the rightness of her decision to have him removed. 

Stark’s men surrounded Ser Barristan, bare steel in their mailed fists. 

“And now the treason moves from words to deeds,” Cersei said. “Do you think Ser Barristan stands alone, my lord?” 

Sandor Clegane drew his longsword and her men followed him along with the Kingsguard.

“Kill him!” Joffrey screamed down from the Iron Throne. “Kill all of them, I command it!”

“You leave me no choice,” he said before he called out to Cersei’s bought man. “Commander, take the queen and her children into custody. Do them no harm, but escort them back to the royal apartments and keep them there, under guard.” 

Cersei scoffed. 

“Men of the Watch!” Janos Slynt shouted, donning his helm. A hundred gold cloaks leveled their spears and closed. 

“I want no bloodshed,” Lord Stark told the queen. “Tell your men to lay down their swords, and no one need—”

With a single sharp thrust, the nearest gold cloak drove his spear into one of Ned Stark’s guards. The man was dead before his sword hit the floor. And then the slaughter began. Cersei’s other men were to kill the rest of his household...all but Ned Stark and his wild daughter. Cersei would make her pay for Joffrey.  _ A Lannister always pays her debts.  _

As Ned Stark’s men died all around him, Littlefinger slid a dagger from Ned’s sheath and shoved it up under his chin. “I did warn you not to trust me, you know,” Cersei heard him say. 

She followed Lord Stark as he was led out. “Oh poor Renly,” she cried and threw herself on the shrouded body held by men clad in the Baratheon yellow. “I will make those outlaws pay.” She began to walk away, in the direction of the throne room when she stopped by Ned Stark and whispered, “When you play the game of thrones, my lord, you win…” She turned once more to Renly’s body, “Or you die.” 

Renly’s sword swallowing lover Loras Tyrell lay injured being seen to by Grandmaester Pycelle. He, the queen heard, had cut down twenty men before he was subdued with a wound to the chest.  _ But what is one man against five hundred?  _

She motioned to Janos Slynt to hit Ned Stark in the back of the head.  _ Let him be carried to the dungeons.  _ She could not stand to watch him hobble any longer. 

Three days later Varys had still not been able to locate Arya Stark. How hard could it be to find the girl? Cersei was surrounded by incompetent fools and none more so than Meryn Trant who lost the men she had given him to a Braavosi dancer with a wooden sword along with the girl. 

Still, the queen didn’t let that spoil her mood. She ensured the city gates were closed and ordered men to dress as Stark guards on the docks. The moment she showed up they would return her to the Red Keep and if she didn’t, well the queen supposed it was probably because she’d been raped to the death by the miscreants in the streets of King’s Landing. Either way, she would get her just desserts. 

The bells rang out through the city to announce the death of Robert and Cersei had just the outfit to celebrate. If she had to go ahead with the charade of playing a mourning queen, she would...but on her terms. The queen wore a high-collared black silk gown, with a hundred dark-red rubies sewn into her bodice, covering her from neck to bosom, just as her Rhaegar had at The Trident. Cersei had never forgiven Robert for killing him and had taken Rhaegar’s revenge for him. She saw to Robert’s death, and brought Ned Stark low. Jaime and Father would see to Hoster Tully. Cersei Lannister was the lion’s daughter and was destined to be the dragon’s wife. Had he married her, instead of the frail bitch he did, he would have been alive and he would have never looked at the wolf girl. But Cersei knew that it was his father’s decision to forbid them from marrying. Unlike the weak-willed woman he did marry, Cersei did not slink off to live the rest of her years in a grey waste. She took the revenge of the man she loved. Today, the victory was theirs. 

Her first order of the day was having Sansa Stark brought to her. The girl pleaded for the chance to marry Joffrey, was adamant her father was not a traitor and assured the queen that it was her sister who had the traitor’s blood not her.  _ You are both traitors,  _ Cersei thought.  _ You to your family and she to her betters. _ After much wrangling the girl wrote to her kin inviting them to come to King’s Landing and bend the knee. The queen had considered killing them all but that would have to wait until her son’s hold on the throne was secure and Father was back. She learned that the incompetent men she had given instructions to had not held Sansa alone. They had roomed her with some steward’s girl from Ned Stark’s household. The queen could not have that. She ordered the girl removed immediately. Littlefinger said he would see to that...no doubt seeing a new whore for his brothel in the bargain. 

“Not in the city,” Cersei reminded him before she watched Varys stamp each of the four letters with the seal of Eddard Stark. 

The girl had not asked for her sister once.

It was late afternoon when Pycelle brought her a raven addressed to Ned Stark, a bird from The Eyrie. The bitch Catelyn Stark was dead. According to her saggy-titted sister she had been attacked by some wildlings dwelling in the Mountains of the Moon. Her uncle was returning her body to Winterfell. If Cersei could spare the swords she would send them to hunt down the body and bring it back to her just so she could put her head on a spike. Tyrion it seemed was free too. The news hadn’t gladdened Cersei but in the midst of all her dead enemies, it didn’t sadden her either. He was too little a concern for the queen. 

The queen was standing at her window watching the golden tipped spears of her men silhouetted against the red sun of the twilight when Varys came to see her. Cersei fixed the rubies on her neck and turned away from looking down at her kingdom.

“Your Grace,” he said. “Targaryen banners have been spotted flying in Dragonstone.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, what a terrible chapter. Please don’t throw tomatoes at me :’( I love Ned Stark too.
> 
> So to summarise the one true king of Westeros is dead. *grinds teeth in his memory* Where else have we seen a dog kill someone in ASOIAF *wink wink* No one would accuse the new conqueror of Dragonstone of having a hand in such a natural death would they? I presume Oberyn is somewhere smirking menacingly. 
> 
> Varys is being messy as always & stitching people up without their knowledge. 
> 
> Now for the crux of this chapter. I have never hated Ned for speaking to Cersei and giving her an opportunity to flee. Seeing the bodies of Rhaenys and Aegon traumatised him for life. He was this idealistic teenager waging what he thought was a just war the result of which ended up being the deaths of two babies (and Elia in canon). Being in King’s Landing triggered so many of the memories he’d buried over the years. When we judge him we should judge him through that lens. He speaks to Cersei because he knows Robert is not above killing children/approving their murder. Whatever Cersei and Jaime had done, their children were innocent. In canon it ultimately leads to a sad end for him but I will never fault him for doing the right thing. 
> 
> What interests me is Cersei’s equally glaring miscalculation in that scene. She admits to her relationship with Jaime. Ned only accused her of adultery, he couldn’t prove the incest and the attempt on Bran (at least at the tower). She does this without knowing whether her strongwine plot would work. She gets a lucky break when LF sides with her and gives her the gold cloaks because he hates Stannis. I question whether he would’ve helped her had Ned not insisted on Stannis. And if he didn’t help her what would she have done?She and her children could have died. The real idiot here is Cersei not Ned but we don’t talk about that because she won. 
> 
> What I don’t question is her drive to kill Robert. The man needed to go. I just made Varys the one to put the worm in her ear here to set up Renly’s death. 
> 
> Just to finish off my anti-Cersei agenda, only an idiot would write to a Stark whose father she has imprisoned and actually think he’d do it after everything that has happened historically.
> 
> As for Sansa, man! I get that in canon she’s even younger than she is in this timeline but I can’t say that age (rather than experience) would have made her act any differently. AGOT Sansa is wilfully blind and sees the world through songs. An example would be the chapter where she had to go and meet Cersei to write the letter & she intentionally avoids looking at the bodies on the ground not because she’s freaked out by them, but because she might know them. Then, despite feeling that way, she protests for the right to marry Joffrey...I grow to like Sansa as the books go on but we’re still in the AGOT timeline here and she’s very difficult to like. That’s who we’re working with here.
> 
> On a related note, Cersei is so petty for wearing that dress and those rubies in the books. I couldn’t help but end with Rhaegar’s actual son coming back to destroy her world while she’s reminiscing on the future she could have had.


	30. Aegon

**Aegon**

“Theirs is a good camp, if nothing else.” Ser Arthur shot him a smile of approval. The Golden Company were camped on the flatlands, ten miles outside the gates of Pentos. Though the flatlands were vulnerable to Dothraki attack, Illyrio had assured Egg that they were handsomely paid to not interfere with the Free City’s interests - which in this case meant Illyrio’s interests. 

Though Arianne’s grandfather had paid the Golden Company handsomely, Illyrio still hoped that Aegon would give him a position on his council so he saw to it that his stay in Pentos was as comfortable as one could expect. Even with Illyrio’s assurance, the camp was compact and defensible. A deep ditch had been dug around it, with sharpened stakes inside. The tents stood in rows, with broad avenues between them. The latrines had been placed beside the river, so the current would take with it the waste and his Kingsguard had begun overseeing the company’s daily drills and the planning of the conquest of Dragonstone. Though they had captains of their own, the Golden Company’s leadership weren’t diametrically opposed to the idea of being under the Sword of the Morning’s command - not now that they were fashioning themselves as his army. Their own captain-general with his blistered feet and portly body, Jon Connington said, was more suited to ironing out contracts than he was to war. Harry Strickland had risen from the Company’s paymaster to it’s captain-general after the death of Ser Myles Toyne, a long time friend of Lord Connington. The Kingsguard also knew Westeros in a way these men could only imagine - many had never been home. 

“I can still think of at least five ways to overrun this camp,” Ser Gerold said, unapproving. 

Ser Oswell only winked at Egg. “But you’d lose men doing so.” 

Lord Connington stayed silent. He had been the biggest advocate for the union of the black and red dragon in Aegon’s name alongside Haldon who had also once traveled with the company as well. Jon had since taken to remaining quiet when Ser Gerold spoke, no doubt content in his small victory and his chance to go home. Like the men in the Golden Company, he too was an exile. 

Of all his companions, Ser Gerold had been the one most opposed to the alliance. 

“There is no black dragon here,” he reminded Egg. “We threw the last of them into the sea in the War of the Ninepenny kings. These are sellswords, Your Grace, nothing more but in Westeros... at home...people will remember only their name and their terror.” 

“I have no other choice,” Egg reminded him. “My uncles cannot both help me take back what is mine and protect their own lands.”

Despite the fact that Ser Gerold had led the Targaryen host in the Golden Company’s last war against Westeros, many were in awe of Egg’s Kingsguard. The legends of the Sword of the Morning and Ser Oswell Whent reigned strong even here but it was Ser Gerold’s name that cowed men most. The tent of Ser Harry of House Strickland, the Golden Company’s captain-general, still sported the skull of Maelys the Monstrous whose host Ser Gerold had defeated when Ser Barristan Selmy killed the pretender in single combat. Next to that, was Maelys’ brother accompanied by an assortment of disfigured and cracked skulls gilded in gold. Above them all was the skull of Aegor Rivers, Bittersteel, the Blackfyre founder of the Golden Company. _What would he think of this?_ Aegon wondered as he stared at the grinning skull. He had been the one to institute this tradition of the company. On his deathbed, Ser Aegor Rivers had famously commanded his men to boil the flesh from his skull, dip it in gold, and carry it before them when they crossed the sea to retake Westeros. Despite what he stood for, they would be carrying him with them on their journey home. This time, to lay him to rest for good Aegon hoped. They could not afford to be thrown back into the sea. 

After so many years of war between the red and black dragons, Aegon wished to heal what the Aegon before him had wrought. He couldn’t help but laugh bitterly at the thought. He sought to heal with war. _What other option is there,_ he asked himself. This was the only way he could be safe and united with his mother and the only way he could bring justice to those who had ruined their lives.

A month ago at Illyrio’s manse, after a tense first meeting, the captains of the Golden Company laid their swords at his feet, swearing to fight for him, not just for money but as leal men fighting for their prince - and king once crowned. Aegon did not for a second believe that their fealty came without strings attached. He in turn promised each of the captains positions and lands after his conquest. Many wanted to reclaim lands of which they had been dispossessed. Each sported names centuries-old, some even had old names extinct in Westeros. There were Strongs, Peakes, a Mudd and Mandrake, a Lothston and two Coles alongside those with bastard names: Rivers, Hill, Stone, Flowers, all were here. _All but Snows_ . Ser Gerold was keen to remind him that with no one alive to dispute them, many of the men claimed whatever family names they wished in this “ _brotherhood of exiles_.” 

While most hailed from Westeros, the company also had serjeants and captains from other lands. Egg was fluent in the Low Valyrian of the Free Cities and had no difficulty in speaking to the common soldiers. The soldiers higher up in the company’s hierarchy all spoke the Common Tongue. The company paymaster, Gorys Edoryen, was a Volantene and the spymaster a Lyseni named Lysono Maar. With his own lilac eyes and white-gold hair he looked like he could have been kin to Aegon - even if Egg mistook him for a woman the first time they met. The man had full lips, painted his nails and had earlobes weighed heavy by jewellery of pearls and amethysts. The most notable of the foreign men in the Golden Company however was Black Balaq, the white-haired, black-skinned commander of the company’s thousand bows. He divided his men into four contingents: a third used crossbows, another third used double-curved horn bows common to Essos, and the Westerosi among them used yew longbows while Black Balaq and his men from the Summer Islesmastered goldenheart bows like his cousin Sarella used on that first visit to Winterfell. 

Aegon’s thoughts turned north often. He thought of his mother who was insistent that the time had come for her to speak to her husband of Aegon. “I cannot deceive my husband any longer,” he heard her whisper to Uncle Oberyn one night in the house in Winter Town. “Every day I look into his face, I sleep in his bed, and I lie to him. I can’t do this for much longer!”

Aegon hid himself in a corner, unsure of how to respond or comfort his mother. When this was done, _if it was ever done_ , he resolved to speak to Lord Glover, to apologise for all the lies and hope he understood. In his mother’s life, Lord Glover had been the only saving grace of his own father’s folly. He wondered whether his mother _had_ spoken to Lord Glover. 

After that visit north he returned to Essos heavy with worry. The worlds of all he met in Winterfell were likely to change because of his actions. His worry did not extend to his companions.

The Kingsguard were aghast at the news of Ser Jaime Lannister’s children. “An oathbreaker twice over,” Ser Oswell called him. The others made similar remarks. Lord Connington laughed until he turned as red as his hair. “Robert Baratheon, a cuckold,” he guffawed. For a man who so rarely laughed the expression sat awkwardly on his face. The years had made him a serious man weighed down by his own feelings of failure. He blamed himself for all that befell House Targaryen. “Had I killed Robert Baratheon when I should have, your sister would be alive today...and Rhaegar.” 

“My prince,” Franklyn Flowers bowed as he approached him. “Sers...Jon.” He inclined his head at each in turn. With a smile, he said, “I believe your fleet is here.” 

Arianne and his uncle Oberyn had brought with them the fleet his mother had ordered built when he was only a boy. His was a conquest seventeen years in the making. The fleet was large enough to transport all ten thousand men of the Golden Company, their numerous horses and the two dozen elephants that were Harry Strickland’s pride. No warhorse in Westeros could withstand them. Ever since Aegon first came to the camp, even his dreams were filled with their trumpets. 

His uncle had gone a step further. Not only did he bring him a black-sailed fleet, he brought him the three thousand men of the sellsword company he set up in his own years in Essos. 

That night, after three months apart, he took the time to get reacquainted with his bride. He had missed her... _All of her._ After their return from Westeros, Egg stayed in Pentos, while Arianne returned home to Dorne.

Among the men were Arianne’s grandfather’s men as well; men sent to see that Arianne Martell, daughter of the Lady Mellario and granddaughter of their magister was crowned Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. 

\---

“Now, we sail for home,” Oberyn announced, as he stepped into their family’s central pavilion. He spoke with a smile that did not reach his eyes. Their pavilion and the adjoining tents were guarded by Norvoshi and Dornish men and encircled by Oberyn’s own. For weeks they had been ready to sail for home. The bulk of the army had broken camp and taken to the galleys but Prince Oberyn had assured them that he was waiting ‘ _to see which way the wind blows_.” Whenever they asked for more he would reply that he was waiting for Doran to tell him who they could rely on when they made landfall. 

Oberyn Martell pat the back of a Dornish boy with straight black hair. Aegon had never met him before. Lady Nym lifted the flap to walk in behind him.

“You liar, you!” she tutted, waving a finger at him. “You could have told me who you were! Both you and Aunt Elia!!” Even as she told him off she was striding purposefully to him. She wrapped her arms around him in a warm embrace before she kissed both his cheeks. “Though I’d still be proud to call you, little brother,” she added with a smile. He’d met her for the first time during his first visit to Deepwood Motte - a visit he sent intimidated by her questioning. 

“Trystane!” Arianne wrapped her arms around the boy when she walked in. “Nym!” Tyene came in next. Ashara, Lemore and the Kingsguard were already with him, as was Jon Connington. 

Aegon moved to greet the boy. 

“Your Grace,” he bowed politely. Broad-shouldered and still growing, Trystane Martell had a polite demeanour to him. 

“Cousin,” Egg replied, pulling him into an embrace.

“Brother,” Arianne added. “This is soon to be your brother.” 

Once greetings were exchanged, Oberyn Martell shared his and Prince Doran’s plan to test the waters. 

“Have you lost your mind?” Ashara shouted, balling a raised hand into a fist. “How could you risk his life like that?” 

“We couldn’t go in blind, Ashara. The man agreed to be Robert’s Hand. We would place Aegon on the throne with or without him but it would be a great deal easier to have him _with_ us...or at least not against us,” he amended. “We did not intend to risk his life. Ours were unproven rumours untraceable to him. We did not mention anything of Os or Arthur or Ser Gerold here. Only the two of you.” He pointed between Ashara and Lord Connington. “ _How_ were we to know they’d send an assassin after his son or that his wife would seize the Imp or that the Kingslayer would take to attacking him in the streets?” 

Catelyn Stark had accused Tyrion Lannister of trying to kill Bran. A shiver passed through Aegon and a shadow came to his mind’s eye, the shadow he’d seen the day Bran fell. _What would the Lannisters want with Bran?_ He had paid scant attention to the youngest Lannister. When Egg returned to his companions he had regaled them with tales of just how much Bran admired them. The boy had recited the names of all his favourite knights going back to even before the conquest. Egg had not wanted to leave until he knew the boy had survived but he couldn’t have waited any longer.

“He would _not_ have attacked the Hand of the King!” 

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Ser Arthur corrected her. “He killed a king. A Hand is a step down from that.” 

“Why do we care?” Jon asked. “Let all three of them burn in the seven hells.”

“He committed treason for me,” Aegon reminded him. Ned Stark had not only resigned, swearing to play no part in Robert’s desire to wage war on Dorne and his uncles all with the aim of killing Aegon and his mother. He had sent his own man to Prince Doran to forewarn him to close his borders and to send Aegon far from Robert’s reach. His uncle had already secured his borders before word left Dorne. His cousin, Prince Quentyn Martell, in the company of Lord Yronwood had blocked the Boneway while his cousin Obara along with Lord Fowler and the lords of Dorne’s west had blocked the Prince’s Pass. _The place of my brother’s birth. This is not how I wanted Lord Stark to find out._

According to Lord Varys, Ned Stark had also planned before the attack on him to send a man north to hide his mother and Jon from Robert and had plans to fortify the North from attack. Jaime Lannister on the other hand, fled the city that night for the Westerlands. Nym sailed for Pentos the next morning with Trystane. 

“Treason is nothing to the likes of Ned Stark,” Jon scoffed and waved a hand dismissively. 

“I would remind you, my lord, that my mother is only alive today thanks to him.” Even with this gesture, would he still have good-will for them? What did this mean for his mother among the northmen if Ned Stark prepared them for war to protect a Targaryen child and his mother? _Mother is of the north now too,_ he tried to reassure himself. 

“What of the girls?” Arianne asked. “Did Bran travel south with them as well?” 

“Only Sansa and Arya did. Bran is awake though,” Nym added with relief. “And doing well from what the Spider told me. They were secured by their father’s men.” 

_And by the time I return home, they could all be orphans because of me._ His thoughts turned to his brother...to Arya and her sister both of whom were vulnerable without their father. 

“What of my mother?” Aegon asked. “Does she know you did this?” He thought of the worries she had about her husband. 

“If Ned Stark’s man has gone north then I suppose she will soon.” 

“You should have warned her! Her husband-” 

“I am sure he knows by now. Elia was going to tell him the moment they returned to Deepwood Motte.” 

“If he knew, Ned Stark would have known.” 

“Perhaps he did,” Arianne said, squeezing his hand. “He moved quickly enough to warn my father.” 

Somehow Egg did not believe that. “ _Some men are just good,_ ” his mother once said of Ned Stark. And if he was just that and not forewarned of Aegon’s existence then his mother could be in a very difficult position. She once told Egg that her husband was Lord Stark’s man first and foremost and that it was the reason she had never told him of Egg; in fear that the day may come when Lord Stark prevented him from visiting her. Egg’s presence would risk the north. Now he knew, Lord Stark was clearly intent on protecting her person. _What of her heart? And the only thing she had created for herself?_

“Perhaps Arya told him who you are,” Arianne continued. 

“Arya?” Oberyn cocked an eyebrow at him. 

“She heard me speaking to Mother...she thought Jon was my mother’s son…” He began fidgeting with his hands when Lemore cleared her throat and inclined her head at his hands. He stopped. “She heard me calling him my brother.” Egg did not want to get into _how_ she claimed to have overheard him. He did not quite believe it himself but he did know no one was in the vicinity when he spoke to his mother that night. _No one but the wolves._

Everyone looked at him as if he were mad. 

“Jon?” 

Aegon sighed loudly. Half the room did not know. 

“Jon Snow?” Nymeria looked perplexed.

Tyene gasped, eyes widening. “No.” She looked at the Kingsguard and back at Egg. 

“Jon is Lyanna Stark’s son born in the Tower of Joy and of my father’s seed.” 

“Rhaegar got the Stark girl with child?” exclaimed Jon Connington in disbelief. 

“Rhaegar married her,” confirmed Os.

“And you all knew!” 

“Why didn’t you tell me you told Arya?”

“Why didn’t you tell me Jon was your brother?” Tyene asked softly. 

“How could you have left Rhaegar’s son with Ned Stark?” 

“Why not?” Ashara requisitioned Jon Connington. “Would you have looked after _your silver prince’s son_ better than his own uncle?”

“He wouldn’t have been a bastard for a start.”

“Arya promised not to say anything-” 

“You risked everything by trusting a girl of four-and-ten.” Oberyn rubbed his face with exasperation.

“A girl of four-and-ten who I hear beat Joffrey bloody and then set her wolf on him - a wolf I hear she named after me,” Nym informed them in a smug voice before trying to diffuse affairs. “You know how she loves Aunt Elia, Father.”

“She beat her own sister’s betrothed?” Jon asked for clarification. 

“Did you say wolf?”

“You hear that Os?”

“Must be the wolf blood Lady Lyanna spoke of.”

His uncle was still looking expectantly at him. “You should have told me,” he sighed. 

“I suppose we’ve both done things we haven’t told others of,” Egg replied sardonically. “Do you have any idea the situation your little idea could put my mother in? She-“

“Your mother was my sister long before she was anything to you, boy,” Oberyn Martell said low and with a loud bang on the table that caused Arianne to gasp. Then to Egg’s surprise, the Red Viper stood with a ferocity that sent his chair flying back. Yet for all his speed, Ser Arthur was in front of Egg before he got there, hand on Dawn’s hilt ready to draw down. Oberyn stared at Arthur first before he dragged his eyes back to Egg. “You will not profess to care for Elia more than me, nephew. Your mother will understand the need for secrecy. As for you…” He turned back to Ser Arthur with a smile and patted him on the chest, “You will never have to protect mine own nephew from me.” 

“Arya wouldn’t risk Jon nor my mother. Not when she knows what happened to her and Rhaenys.” Where he got that certainty from he didn’t know but given how highly she spoke of his brother and his mother he told himself so often that she would not until he was convinced.

“It makes no matter,” Oberyn sighed, relenting. He pushed his hair back from his face and looked resolutely at Egg. “Ned Stark has made his position clear. Now we sail home.”

Varys warned them of a coming war. Tywin Lannister would not take an attack on his son lightly. 

“He will go for the Riverlands,” Ser Oswell said. “He would know he cannot attack the north but the Riverlands border his own.” _Harrenhal lies in his way, home of the Whents._

“Strike soon,” Varys warned, promising to see to the death of Robert and his youngest brother. “I leave Stannis to Prince Oberyn,” Nym told them he said. The thought of using an assassin left a bitter taste in Aegon’s mouth but at the time of their sailing Nym confirmed that he was still alive. _If we have to fight him, we will,_ Egg resolved, though it was Robert he wanted most. _Him and Tywin._

Like the first Aegon, Aegon’s own conquest would start at Dragonstone, the home of House Targaryen. _Unlike The Conqueror I could just as easily die on the quest,_ he thought but there was nothing else for it. 

They were sailing to Dragonstone for more than just sentimental reasons. Built on the mouth of Blackwater Bay, his ancestors’ stronghold would give him a strong base of operations that would enable him to cut King’s Landing off from sea trade and allow him to attack anywhere in The Crownlands with ease.

He’d also heard that Stannis Baratheon had taken to seizing any boat that came within sight of the ancient castle, bulking up his fleet without spending much money. 

Harry Strickland preferred a surprise attack. The Spider suggested that Stannis would employ sellswords if he hadn’t done so already. Based on that information, his Uncle Oberyn suggested they send men ashore to set fire to the fleet. Marq Mandrake and Franklyn Flowers volunteered. Doing that would be to risk two hundred men though. There was no element of surprise to be had on shore. Guardsmen on Dragonstone’s curtain wall and wall walks would spot Marq and his men before they did any real damage to the ships...But they could set fire to the granaries. Though Dragonstone homed fishing villages that allowed people to live off the land and sea, a besieged castle survived only with what they had stored. Aegon did not doubt Stannis Baratheon’s resolve. At Aegon’s age he had held the besieged Storm’s End for a year. Unlike then however, this time he did not only have a garrison made up only of loyal men. Lysono Maar spoke of a Lyseni sellsail who left for Dragonstone with his fleet of thirty ships. By his estimation nearly half of Stannis’ men were sellswords and no man was as fickle as one who fought for gold. 

_I’m one to talk,_ a part of him thought as he looked around at his war council. _Mine want to go home,_ he rectified. _Just like me. Home is a greater reward than gold...though not as certain._

Egg listened to each suggestion in turn, keen to give every man his chance to speak before he gave his decision. 

Ser Mark and Ser Franklyn were to sail to Dragonstone with two hundred men. They were to pose as sellswords who’d broken off from the Golden Company. They were tasked with burning the granaries to the ground once the first attack began. 

As for the rest of the fleet, they would not attack by stealth. Dragonstone would know their coming. Trumpets would herald the return of the dragon.

“Your Grace,” Harry Strickland rasped, “Mine may be the cowardly route and yours the brave but we are like to lose more men if Stannis’ fleet are aware of our return.”

Egg looked at each captain around his war table. Some nodded in agreement, others stared down at the map while his own men looked at him expectantly. Ser Oswell smiled encouragingly at him. He spent many hours teaching him the strengths of each castle in the Seven Kingdoms and the tenets of war craft.

“I do not do this to prove myself bold nor brave,” Aegon said truthfully. “Given Stannis’ vigilance, it would be difficult for us to retain any true element of surprise. I would rather draw his ships out to my preferred position. So long as his own ships are beached, it is impossible for us to defeat them in close combat. They would constantly be reinforced from the shore.” 

Ser Oswell’s smile grew wider and Ser Arthur nodded at him but it was the glint of approval in Ser Gerold’s eye that he had sought most. 

Forming his fleet in the crescent formation the Braavosi used in their wars against Pentos, Egg vowed to lead the attack himself. His uncle grumbled in private and his companions, the men who had raised him, tried to talk him out of his decision. Arianne cried that night kissing every part of his body her lips could reach. She begged him each time to reconsider. Egg could not. The words of his brother and Robb Stark ran around his mind. “ _The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword._ ” He could not hide behind others and claim to be a conqueror. Men would die in the coming battle and he would not leave them to face that fate alone. Despite her tears in private, she stood strong by his side when it was time to go to war, planting a kiss on his cheek as he left.

“Don't die,” was the only command of the Dornish Princess. 

"I'll try," he whispered as he kissed her brow.

On the day the battle began, Egg stood in the forecastle of his four-hundred oar flagship _Balerion -_ named after The Conqueror’s dragon and his sister’s kitten. The light drained away with the dusk. The moon seemed swallowed under the dense layer of cloud. The salt-kissed sea air carried with it a tincture best associated with a coming storm - real or imagined. Egg had heard the stories of the worst storm in living memory that raged the night his grandmother had given birth to her last stillborn child. Ser Willem spoke of monstrous waves that came out of nowhere and smashed the Targaryen fleet to splinters. When they were children, Viserys was adamant that krakens had risen up to wrap their tentacles around the ships dragging them down. Egg turned his eyes heaven-ward praying against hope that his fleet did not suffer the same fate and then his gaze turned downwards. The boat continued to rock the waves as the wind filled sails carried them further out to sea. _No krakens...yet._

Going to battle in the dead of the night seemed a madness-induced folly but if they were to draw out the enemy they had to rely on the cover of darkness. The scout ship would appear near shore and make them give chase before the another two galleys heralded the attack with trumpets and drew more of Stannis’ fleet out to sea. 

They made quick work of each of the four galleys sent out after theirs, boarding and capturing three and sinking the fourth. Their prisoners all painted a similar story. Stannis Baratheon had died three days ago and the sellswords had already begun to speak of leaving. Without their numbers Stannis’ men numbered three thousand men. Three thousand men growing hungrier each day once their stores burnt down.

Then came the drums the closer they got to Dragonstone. This late into the night, at the hour of the eel, Dragonstone hid under the cover of darkness but Egg could spot flickering lights where he imagined land must be. The fleets met not far from the land of his birth in a battle so cruel and fierce that the prows of each involved gallery sported some mark of the encounter. All his men followed the order to shelter in the galleys’ forecastles and behind the bulwarks while Black Balaq’s crossbowmen rained arrows down on those who got too close. The Baratheon fleet threw all their might at them in volleys of arrows and missiles. They waited them out until the barrage stopped and their own started. Black Balaqs’ marksmanship and that of his Summer Islanders’ with their goldenheart bows and fire arrows and the precision of the crossbowmen carried the battle for Egg. They seized thirty ships, drowned ten others and followed the last group in a crazed dash for the island. 

The battle on the shores was bloody, for the Baratheon men and their sellswords. Most were free riders in boíled leather who stood no chance against the armoured men of the Golden Company. Ser Arthur danced among men with Dawn in his hands glinting even in the dawn. Oberyn Martell’s spear spun in the air and took a life with every descent and lunge. Beside him was his daughter Nymeria who refused to be left on the ships with Arianne, Ashara, Tyene and Lemore whose prayers Egg was sure were with them. Even Haldon had come ashore now though not far from the boats. With him was Trystane, Aegon’s now squire. 

By midday Egg was covered in blood and gore and sand but the battle was over. And the siege began. Sellswords had no appetite for long sieges. They wanted quick plunder or rich land to settle upon. 

Though sellswords numbered amongst his own men, The Golden Company, the Dornish and the small Norvoshi force formed an army of disciplined men prepared to undertake siege warfare. Oberyn’s sellswords were the only ones in it for pay but they were here for their bond to Oberyn Martell. 

Dragonstone was not an easy castle to storm but they did what they could to make life very hard for those inside. They shot down ravens and it was clear that Marq Mandrake and Franklyn Flowers were causing trouble inside. Though they were under strict instructions not to harm Stannis Baratheon’s family - the Lady Shireen in particular - Egg could see small fires in the Sea Dragon Tower and heard shouts from inside. Whatever they were doing inside was having an effect. 

The tower was the place where his mother had given birth to him...and to Rhaenys. Shaped eponymously, the Sea Dragon Tower had once been home to Visenya Targaryen and Rhaenyra after her. Haldon had taken to teaching Egg of every detail of the home he had never seen over the years and Viserys tried his best to sound as if he remembered the home that faded from his memory. Ser Arthur and Oswell looked up at the castle fondly. Ashara’s gaze was more forlorn once she too had come ashore. 

Everywhere Egg looked, he was met by a dragon. The Windwyrm loomed in the distance. Shaped like a dragon the tower seemed to scream defiance with the wind. Even the mountain from which smoke wisped was named after a dragon. And behind him, along with the sun and spear of Dorne, the golden banner of the Golden Company and the griffin to which Jon Connington looked at with longing, the black banner and red three-headed dragon of House Targaryen flapped behind him. Those inside could not doubt who had landed on their shores. _My shores._ The castle in front of him had belonged to his family. After so long hiding and relying on the kindness of others, Aegon, if he took back this castle, would finally have a home to call his own. Aegon Targaryen, King of Nothing, Protector of No One, and Lord of Nowhere would have somewhere to call his own. This place of his birth...this place where his grandmother died all while Stannis prepared to storm their home. Whenever pity for the man came to him, he’d steel his heart with Jon Connington’s words. “Would he have the same concern for you do you think? He would build his claim on your grave and on the graves of those bastards Robert claims.” 

Egg looked up instead at the stronghold with yearning. The castle of black stone was said to be shaped by dragonfire, Valyrian arts and sorcery. Aegon couldn’t help but smile at how Winterfell and Storm’s End and even the High Tower of the Hightowers were said to be built with _magic_ while Dragonstone was raised with the dark art of sorcery. _Will I be looked at with similar mistrust?_

Jon Connington, in a rare display of delight, came to stand beside him and took to pointing out the griffins along the castle walls. Where most castles had gargoyles and grotesques, Dragonstone’s walls spotted basilisks, cockatrices, griffins, hellhounds and creatures long gone with Valyria itself. The dark stones brought to his mind Bran Stark’s accident once more. The boy had landed in the hay that day, stood, and was about to say something when he was struck. The shadow returned to his mind. Ever since the news came of Lady Stark seizing the Imp, the shadow had always been there. The more he thought of it, the more convinced he became that something… someone had been on the tower that day. Egg could have sworn the shadow was someone taller. _What had Bran seen in the tower such that an assassin would be sent to silence him?_ Everything that he’d seen of Ned Stark’s wife, and he had seen little, seemed to tell him she was not an impulsive woman. She would not have acted rashly and nearly started a war without true evidence. Nymeria had said she fought off the assassin herself and that Bran was saved by his wolf. There was something unusual about those creatures but they had saved the lives of their masters twice over from what he heard. And if Arya was to be believed, they had a link to the Stark children he couldn’t truly understand. He thought of the blazing, knowing, red eyes of his brother’s wolf. 

A week in, Egg was woken at dawn. Arianne was draped across his front. 

“What is it?” he whispered to Ser Oswell who was trying hard not to look even as a smile twitched at the corner of his lips at the picture they made. 

Marq Mandrake and Franklyn Flowers and their small company made their way out of the gates under a storm of arrows raining down on them from the castle walls. They lost twenty men in the dash up the shore and more inside. Of the two hundred men Egg had sent with them, fifty remained, if that. Franklyn Flowers was grasping a poorly bandaged arm. 

They threw at his feet a terrified girl… _a crying girl_ judging from the small whimpers he heard. Egg bent down to raise her up. She was a slight thing, black of hair. When she stood she kept her head bowed, her hair draped across her face. 

Egg tilted his head to try and get a better look at her. 

“The Lady Shireen Baratheon,” Marq declared. 

Egg put his hand below her chin and tilted her face up. Blue eyes met purple. She covered the side of her face immediately with her hair. It was covered in cracked, flaking skin black in colour and stony to the touch. Uncle Oberyn had told him of her childhood bout with greyscale. 

“Hello, cousin,” he said with a smile he hoped seemed encouraging. “I will not harm you.” 

In the distance, he made out the sound of drawn swords.

“Shireen!” a man shouted. “Let me through! Shireen!” 

The girl turned her head.

“Who is that man?” he asked. 

“My father’s man,” she whispered, bristling from Aegon’s touch. “Ser Davos Seaworth.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love that in the books Ser Arthur is long dead but people associate orderly and defensible camps with him. Both Jon Con and Jaime think of him within this context so I couldn’t help but have Arthur giving the GC camp his approval lmao.  
> Dragonstone is around 3 days from Pentos (from the research I’ve done and around seven from King’s Landing hence why Aegon and co have news of the attack on Ned but don’t know whether he’s woken up when they sail). There were around 28/29 days between Ned being attacked and Robert dying (a week of which Ned was unconscious after his own attack). So Egg and co sail from Pentos around the same time as when Ned wakes up. 
> 
> Of course Varys knew what Ned had planned & the only reason Tom & Cayn & Jory make it out is because he let them. Remember in the books he knows about the dagger from Ser Rodrik talking secretly to Ser Aron Santagar (the Dornish Master of Arms & a relation of one of Arianne’s closest friends. For now put a pin on him 😉).  
> Stannis took some of the Royal Fleet to Dragonstone, but not all of it. He has 100 ships at Blackwater but I couldn’t find anything that made it clear to me how many he had at Dragonstone pre-War of the Five Kings. I gather that he was also building new ships and that his lords provided some (e.g. The Lord of the Tides - but that came after Stannis declared himself king). In Maester Cressen’s chapter we also see he was seizing cogs & carracks and any ship that come near Dragonstone as well. 
> 
> Elia on the other hand has been having Egg’s war fleet built since he was a toddler. It’s large enough to carry all the GC & co, not to mention the elephants - beyond that please don’t ask for specifics lmao. #imagineit.  
> When Stannis met Renly at Storm’s End he had around 5,000 men. From Maester Cressen’s chapter we know he had 3,000 men and two thousand sellswords - I’m going to assume not all of those have arrived yet in this chapter because Maester Cressen’s chapter happens some time after the Whispering Wood. So I’m going with modest 3000-4000 men at Dragonstone both there to defend the castle and man the fleet. Egg attacks Dragonstone with the ten thousand men of the Golden Company, 3,000 of Oberyn’s sellswords and maybe a thousand Dornish and five hundred Norvoshi. *waves hand at the specifics I’m not a battle writer lol but you get it they have significantly more men, provisions and better ships. I also don’t doubt some of the men would leave Dragonstone the moment Stannis died. Many men were loyal to him (or the money he offered). I doubt sellswords would be loyal to his daughter against such a large host. 
> 
> I’m developing a bad habit of always splitting Egg’s chapters up but they get a little long/usually have 2 big, different beats so more on Egg in Westeros next chapter including more with Shireen. The news of Ned’s arrest arrives, as does Cat’s death and Tywin’s move into the Riverlands. If Egg’s reaction about what the little Dornish trick means for his mother seems subdued, it’s because none of them actually know how things have played out.  
> All in all, the next chapter is less a summary and more about coming to terms with the changing reality of things on the ground…


	31. Aegon

**Aegon**

Beyond, the sound of crashing waves and the trumpets of the Golden Company’s elephants filled the air. The wind blowing off the Narrow Sea caused the banners of House Targaryen, firmly situated above Dragonstone’s Stone Drum tower, to stretch taut like a pointing finger. _We made it home,_ Egg said to the golden skull of Aegor Rivers which they were interring today along with all those who died in foreign lands always looking west, always hoping for home. It was an unusual feeling, calling something your own. All his life Egg had felt adrift. Sometimes he wondered whether the wanderlust that ran through his blood was just him searching for somewhere to call his own. Here he could imagine a future, here he could feel the prince, the king he was supposed to be, here he felt fear. He feared he had something to lose, something tangible. And in the caverns below the castle, as he ran his fingers on the stones etched with the names of the ancestors’ whose ashes were interred there, Egg felt the weight of his ancestors’ expectations. _Maegor, Jaehaerys, Alysanne._ So many of them were here...all the way to _Rhaella,_ the grandmother who died alone in this castle. Their legacy was now his to see through. The fate of House Targaryen, it seemed, hung on his shoulders as did the hopes of the ten thousand men who sailed west with him.

Once the man once named Bittersteel was interred, Egg made his way to the sept, the place he knew The Conqueror had prayed. The statues in the sept were carved from the masts of the ships that had carried the first Targaryens from Valyria. Egg prayed for his mother and her health. He’d written her a letter the first night the castle became theirs. He had not yet sent it. He’d hoped to send it with one of his cousins rather than by raven but with all that had taken place and with all the news yet to arrive, he wanted to wait until they knew more about the lay of the land. With that letter he wrote a second. One to her husband. By now he would have known of Egg and soon he would know of his return. Egg would have much preferred seeing the man again, and sitting across from him as they spoke but a letter would have to suffice for now. Most of it spoke of his mother and how in the nightmare that became her life, Lord Glover was the one comfort she had - one that Egg was grateful for as well.

He also prayed for Arianne, and Lord Stark regarding whom they still had no news, for the injured among his men, for the wisdom with which to lead them and for strength, above all strength. It seemed that overnight he went from a boy playing at war under the supervision of the men who raised him to the commander of a very real army in a very real war. They had lost men in the naval battle and the taking of this castle. Under the tutelage of Ser Gerold, Ser Arthur and Ser Oswell there was room for him to doubt himself, to turn to them with questions. Now there was not. Not while others watched him. Egg wanted to be the man they wanted, not the boy he felt. The only comfort he found in it all was Arianne. She had taken his hand the previous night and walked him out to sea. It was a calm night on what he heard were normally stormy waters. 

“Are you sure you know how to swim?” she teased him when he said he would not go in. It didn’t seem right for a man supposed to lead an army to frolic at sea when he had just conquered a castle and his men lay injured. 

“You have spent day and night with your men,” she said as if she could read his mind. “You have more than done your duty. No one will begrudge you a dip in the sea. Now...are you sure you can swim?” she husked. “Because if you don’t-” 

He didn’t wait for her to finish. He pulled her into his arms, taking in her laughter, adoring how it felt, and jumped into the sea. 

“My dress,” she squealed. 

He pulled them down. She was still squealing when they came back up for air but before he knew it she was laughing again. Her hair was plastered over her cheeks. “I can’t believe you did that!” 

“Still believe I can’t swim?” he asked, kissing her. It was a welcome moment of levity and one for which he was grateful. 

Her lips pressed against his, stroking a fire in him, like a kindling into a roaring fire, his affection made way for growing passion with every touch of hers. Her hands left a trail of sparks in their wake on his body. He held her tighter returning her urgency, kissing her throat, and her collarbone, he tasted the salt, and night’s heat on her skin.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered against her lips.

“I know,” she said laughing. Her warm breath caressed his lips. 

And just as easily as he could laugh with her, he found it easy to share his fears with her as well. 

“I fear I will fail,” he told her in the dark of their bed. “And I cannot fail. If I do I would lose you, my mother, everything.” 

“There is no reward without risk, Egg.” She stroked his cheek and kissed him. “I would gladly walk with you on this road, whatever comes next. All of us will.” 

After his prayers, Egg, shadowed today by Ser Gerold, crossed the gallery of the Sea Dragon Tower where the Lady Shireen was housed along with her mother, Ser Davos Seaworth and four of his sons - three of whom they had captured at sea. From there, he passed through the middle and inner walls to the Stone Drum Tower. It’s Great Hall was carved in the shape of a huge dragon lying on its belly; the heavy red doors of the hall were set in the mouth. Entering the Hall, Egg passed beneath the gateway teeth and through the dragon's maw.

When they took the castle, House Baratheon had barely a thousand men left. Shireen had surrendered the castle to him requesting that he let the men inside live.

Jon Connington had suggested slaughtering them all. Ser Gerold called for mercy. “Give them freedom of the castle but take their weapons,” he advised. Egg had taken a middle ground between the two. 

Those who surrendered were allowed to live, the sellswords were allowed to leave and those who handed Lady Shireen to Marq Mandrake and Franklyn Flowers were thrown into the dungeons. Men who would surrender were one thing, those who would betray their vows were something else entirely. The men had tied up the girl’s mother and killed her uncle, the castellan, Axel Florent who fought them off and threw her fool into the sea. Then they handed the cowering girl over to men who were enemies just to protect their lives - something the men of the Targaryen fleet had wanted to do to Viserys before Ser Willem saved him. If they would betray Shireen today, they would betray him tomorrow. He remembered Benjen Stark in Winterfell speaking to the northern lords of the Wall’s need for men. Perhaps he would send them there.

Ser Davos Seaworth, onion knight and the smuggler who had taken his mother back to Dorne after the fall of King’s Landing, said it was an act Stannis Baratheon would have approved of. Stannis had knighted the man and granted him lands for his onions and took the last joint of each of his fingers for the smuggling. _‘A good act does not wash out the bad, nor a bad act the good,’_ He said Stannis told him. ‘ _Each should have its own reward. You were a hero and a smuggler.’_

Egg seemed to learn more about the man who had held this castle over the past few days. He got tales of a just man, unyielding and hard. The talk of his justice made Egg feel torn. A good man was killed to pave his way - one who may have done the same to Egg.

None knew him more than the old maester who had helped raise him. Maester Cressen was well past eighty, white-haired and frail. Another maester, Pylos, much younger than even Haldon, had been sent to Dragonstone two years previously to aid the ailing Cressen. “And still, I live,” he said by way of explanation. 

Cressen told Egg of the first Lord Baratheon he had served - Lord Steffon Baratheon son of Princess Rhaelle Targaryen and cousin to Egg’s own grandfather. He had served as a page in King’s Landing at the same time as his cousin and a young Tywin Lannister. “An affable lord,” Maester Cressen called him. The three became good friends and fought in the War of the Ninepenny Kings together. Lord Steffon’s father, Ormund, fell while they fought against Maelys’ forces on The Stepstones. There was a pointedness to the maester’s voice as he narrated this part of the story, no doubt aimed at the Golden Company who Egg had brought back home. 

Still, the maester went on. Aerys, growing sick of Tywin Lannister as Hand and his attempts to marry Rhaegar to his daughter, sent Lord Steffon across the narrow sea on a mission to Old Volantis, to seek a suitable bride for Prince Rhaegar, for ‘ _a maid of noble birth from an old Valyrian bloodline_.’

“My lord found no such bride,” the maester explained. “There was talk that Aerys had planned to replace Tywin with Lord Steffon but that was not to be either. I was there the day he died.The storm came up suddenly, howling, and Shipbreaker Bay proved the truth of its name. My lord’s two-masted galley Windproud broke up within sight of his castle. From its parapets Stannis and Robert watched as their father’s ship was smashed against the rocks and swallowed by the waters. A hundred oarsmen and sailors went down with Lord Steffon Baratheon and his lady wife, and for days thereafter every tide left a fresh crop of swollen corpses on the strand below Storm’s End. The day my lord died, I became a father.” He smiled wistfully, raising a freckled finger covered in thin skin to his collar. “When a maester dons his collar, he puts aside the hope of children, and yet Robert, Stannis, Renly … three sons I have raised after the angry sea claimed Lord Steffon. Now Stannis is gone. I understand you had him no good-will, Prince Aegon, nor do you extend such good will to Robert,” the Maester said. “But Shireen is a good child, a pure child and has done you no ill. She is an orphan, left alone. Do her no harm.”

“I won’t.” Egg had no plans to harm the girl despite Lord Connington’s calls to end the usurper’s line once and for all. For all the Griffin lord’s extreme suggestions, Egg knew why he was the way he was. 

“I wanted the glory of slaying Robert in single combat, and I did not want the name of butcher. So Robert escaped me and cut down Rhaegar on the Trident. Butchery is a bitter pill, Egg,” he told him. “But valor and mercy can still bring ill. I failed your father with them. I only mean to protect you from an early grave as well. Let this girl live and her mother will do all she can to raise a rebellion against you.” 

Egg thanked him for his advice but remained adamant that his conquest would not end in the same way as Robert’s - with the blood of children. To do so would be to become what he fought against. Ashara warned him before they set sail that every act of his would be judged by those who would liken him to his grandfather. It was why he sought out the girl two days after he captured the castle to share his terms himself. 

The girl sat alone even though her mother was in the room. Selyse Florent was a tall thin woman, pale eyed and sharp-nosed. Her defiant chin was always in the air whenever she looked at Aegon. 

“Judging by her ears that one’s a Florent,” Ser Oswell whispered the first time they saw her. “And therefore Stannis’ wife.”

Before the meeting the girl requested Ser Davos there as well. The onion knight arrived shortly after Egg. Davos Seaworth was a slight man. He wore a well-worn green cloak, stained by salt and spray and faded from the sun, over a brown doublet and breeches that matched brown eyes and hair. About his neck a pouch of worn leather hung from a thong. He’d rub the pouch often. His small beard was well peppered with grey, and he wore a leather glove on his maimed left hand.

When he arrived, Egg sat down with the three of them. In his company was Ser Gerold, a Hightower of Oldtown and someone who had known Lady Selyse’s father and uncles. 

“I do not mean to harm you, my lady” he told Shireen that first meeting. Though sat next to the onion knight, she seemed to all but hide behind him. 

“Did your men not harm her when they took her against her will?” her mother shot back at Aegon.

Egg chose to ignore her, speaking to the girl instead. He told her of what happened to his own family when King’s Landing fell - how his sister had died, how the boy put in his place was mercilessly killed and how his own mother nearly lost her life. 

“I am sorry for that...my...prince,” she whispered, her doubt of what to call him was clear in her hesitance. 

“Thank you,” he said smiling. “We are cousins, you and I. I would like us to be kin.”

Somewhere along their conversation, Lady Selyse broached the subject of a marriage between Egg and Shireen. 

“It is a proposal that would bring much good,” Egg said courteously...carefully. “But I am already betrothed, my lady. And a man who would break his word is not one deserving of being king.”

“Not even for peace? If,” she raised a finger in the air, pointed at him. “what you say about the Lannister woman’s children is true, and I am inclined to believe it, then Shireen is the true heir…” She let her words hang. 

“The Lady Shireen would have Storm’s End from me. Nothing more.”

“She is her uncle’s heir and if you would avoid Robert’s wrath, and you should fear it, your own father fell to it after all, then you would marry my daughter, make peace with her uncle and hold this castle of yours. You will have no more in Westeros.”

“I am no fool, Lady Selyse and neither are you. Robert Baratheon would not suffer a Targaryen on these shores. He has already declared his intentions to have me killed, a second time. The first time, my death brought him much pleasure, even when he was presented with the body of a baby whose head was smashed beyond recognition.” 

He saw Shireen lift her head up to look at him properly.

“Robert Baratheon will die, my lady. By my hand or another. It does not matter. If we will speak, we should speak of Shireen’s place in a Westeros under the dragon’s rule. Robert sits on a throne built on the bones of my sister, on mine and he will pay for his crimes. Justice aside, I mean to heal the wounds of the past. I mean for Baratheon and Targaryen to be kin once more. I mean to take Shireen into my family, and to care for her as I would any of my kin. Together Orys and Aegon conquered kingdoms. Together we can be strong.” He turned to Shireen then. “I would grant you Storm’s End-“

“Storm’s End belongs to my uncle, Renly.” 

If the Spider was to be believed, Renly Baratheon was not long for the world. “Are you close to your uncle?” he asked instead.

“My uncle didn’t often come here...but he was kind whenever we met.”

 _Another death on my conscience,_ Egg thought. “Well, Storm’s End should have been your father’s. And as his heir, it should be yours. I would like us to be close. I would like to wed you to my own cousin, Prince Trystane of Dorne, my brother by marriage-“

“You would put a Martell at the head of House Baratheon?”

 _Yes._ “No,” Egg replied carefully. “Shireen’s children would carry her name... if that is what she and her husband would like. And I would have her child marry mine, if the day ever comes when we are both blessed with offspring. Your grandchild would one day be consort to a king or queen, my lady. I offer Shireen a future at the heart of my rule, as my kin.” _And I would put talk of a rebellion to an end._

“Robert will take back this castle,” the woman scowled. “And if, as you say, he dies that throne is my daughter’s by rights. She would have the strength of the Stormlands behind her. Her uncle Renly would be the first to come to her aid as would House Florent as well.”

“I am not Tywin Lannister, my lady. I will not kill Shireen just to sit on a throne that is mine. I would wish for my _cousin,”_ Shireen looked up as he said that, “and I to be at peace, to be kin. But I am only one man. Behind me are my uncles, and knights and lords who suffered under Baratheon rule. I would never sacrifice Shireen, not for the crimes of others, but there are those who would suggest other ways of dealing with a threat to my rule. I would rather not have to use them. I understand this is all too much to take in, my ladies. I would only ask, for now, that you consider my proposal. There will be time later for us to speak of this again.” 

Since that first terse day, he had taken to inviting them, Ser Davos and his sons to break fast with him every morning. He would then sup every night with the men of the Golden Company. 

It was his cousins who spent most time with Shireen. Tyene and Arianne kept her company most days and he even saw her the day before with Uncle Oberyn who took her, Trystane and Ser Davos’ youngest to see the elephants. 

By the time Egg made it to the small hall, his family were already there. They broke their fast over flatbread with chickpea paste and purple olives. Today Ser Davos Seaworth joined his company along with Lady Shireen. Lady Selyse Florent came too, looking down her nose at them all, not at all like the prisoner she swore she was. 

“Do not mince words with me, Connington,” she scowled when he told her she was not a prisoner. “We both know I am no honoured guest here. I am a prisoner you hold against my will. I would not so much call myself a hostage for my family do not yet know what has taken place here but you cannot hide this forever. And when King Robert finds out-“

“A wise woman would find comfort in knowing her grandchild would be a royal consort,” Jon interrupted. 

“Why rely on a grandchild while my daughter is Robert’s true heir?” 

“If you think Renly Baratheon will hang back while you place your girl on the throne, you have another thing coming, lady,” Uncle Oberyn laughed. 

“Mother,” Shireen said quietly. “Enough. Prince Aegon and I have made common cause and I would put all such talk to rest.” 

Of all in Stannis’ camp, it was the man’s wife Egg trusted least. The girl was amenable but her mother still harbored hopes to make her queen - and hopes that Robert Baratheon would come to their rescue. He felt rotten for hoping to drive a wedge between the mother and daughter but if he were to bring peace he would need Shireen to keep her end of the bargain - her mother was the greatest obstacle to that and Ser Davos his greatest aid. The man had no airs about him and saw the girl’s options for what they were. For now she seemed to pay heed to him more than she did her own mother. 

Egg looked around the table. Oberyn was in deep conversation with his daughters. Ser Oswell, who had a natural ability to talk to anyone, spoke with Ser Davos, and Lord Connington did the same with Ser Arthur and Ser Gerold. Shireen laughed at something Trystane said. Arianne smiled at the two of them. Her eyes twinkled with mischief when they met Egg’s. The smile she gave him made his breath catch in his throat. It was a strange time for such a feeling to wash over him but he felt acutely aware that he could not fail now. To fall would be to risk her. Yes he had Dragonstone but there was a long road between taking back his ancestral home and taking back his ancestors’ throne. His father had failed and thousands died for it. His mother would have too were it not for Lord Stark. 

After breaking their fast Egg met with the Golden Company for another war council. The first of Lysono Mar’s spies had returned from the mainland. There they agreed to send invitations to the bannermen of Dragonstone, summoning them to come, and bend the knee. Principal among them was Lord Monford Velaryon, Lord of the Tides and Master of Driftmark, a lord, Jon Connington said, would be the first to welcome House Targaryen home. 

“Where’s Ashara?” Egg asked after the meeting. He had seen nary a hair of hers for days now. He would spot her in the first day or two ordering the staff around as they began to settle but he would always be in one person’s company or another walking from this place to that. 

“I haven’t seen her,” said her brother. “But her favourite place here was always Aegon’s Garden.”

Egg found her deep in the garden beside the boggy spot where the cranberries grew. Ashara sat on a blanket with three bowls around her and a jug of water beside her. One was filled with leaves, in one she washed the cranberries and in the other were cleaned berries.

“Egg,” she smiled when she saw him. 

“Good morrow, Ma Ashara.” Ashara Dayne had been Egg’s mother in all but blood for the last seventeen years. When he fell ill she was there fussing over him, when he got his spurs she was there cheering him on, and whenever he needed advice she gave it freely. 

“I want to make cranberry pie,” she offered. “Elia loved it when she was carrying you. I thought you might like to try some.” She raised a leaf to say, “And these make a good tea.” 

“I’d love to.” Egg sat down beside her, took the jug and poured water over the latest handful she was washing. 

“Any news?” 

He knew what she wanted to know. “Lysono’s spies from Crackclaw Point have returned. Lord Stark is fine and walking again.” The news gladdened her and a smile bloomed on her face. The Lyseni spymaster had sent men out to different ports even before they set sail from Pentos. The ones who landed in Crackclaw Point were the first to return. “Ser Oswell was right. Tywin Lannister set his sights on The Riverlands. Ser Raymun Darry, Ser Marq Piper, and Ser Karyl Vance traveled to King’s Landing to take news to Lord Stark that Lannister men had ravaged villages near the border of the Westerlands. Lord Stark sent men to root them out and bring the men to justice for their crimes.”

“He didn’t go himself.” She said with a puzzled look. She put the berries down. Then she squared her shoulders and straightened. Looking him in the eye the way she did whenever he lied for Viserys she said, “You’re not telling me everything.”

“You seem to know Lord Stark well.” 

She pursed her lips. “I knew him a lifetime ago. What is it you’re not telling me?” 

“Lord Stark is walking again,” Egg answered. “But he is not yet strong enough to lead the men himself.”

“He would have wanted to. He would not sit back while others did his job for him.” She sighed again and began draining the cranberries. “Has Tywin Lannister been brought to heel?”

“No. His men grow more daring every day.” For a while they sat in silence. Ashara picked more berries and Egg helped her wash them. Aegon’s Garden had a pleasant piney smell to it, and tall dark trees rose on every side. There were wild roses as well, and towering thorny hedges. It was a quiet place far removed from the constant bustle in the keep.

“Ma Ashara…” he started. 

“Hmm.” She looked up at him. Even as she smiled encouragingly at him, a deep melancholy seemed lodged in her eyes. 

“Are you alright? Truly? You haven't seemed yourself since we came here.” 

She put aside the bowl in her hand and gazed out in the direction of the sea. She exhaled with a long sigh that drew her shoulders up and dragged them down again. 

“The last time I was here…” She shook her head. “It has been a long time since any of us were last in Westeros. I suppose it’s taking some time to get used to being back here. So much has changed but not these stones. The lives of all we loved have moved on but I feel like the dark stones of this castle, unmoved, standing still while life moves on all around me. My mother is gone now, my father went before her, my brother too. My sister Allyria is grown. I hear she is to marry soon and I have a nephew I have never met, Ned, The Lord of Starfall, ten-and-six now, a man grown. Before we know it he too will take a bride and Starfall will have a new lady.” She smiled sadly. “Where do I fit into their lives?” She sighed again before forcing herself to smile and tapping his hand with hers. “I suppose you’ll just have to let me into your court, dear one. I have nowhere else to go. Do let an old woman live her last years by your side.” 

“Don’t say that,” Egg protested. “You are not old.” She wasn’t. She wasn’t even forty yet. “You could still marry and have children and a family. You are still the most beautiful woman in Westeros. Men would kill each other for your hand.” 

She rolled her eyes at him. 

“What? You are! I promise you Ma, if we somehow win this war-”

“When.”

“When we win this war,” he amended. “You will never want for anything ever again.” Egg took her hand and kissed it. “I would never want you to leave my side,” he told her honestly. “You are my Ma Ashara, you have been there my whole life. Even when my mother was half a world away, you never let me feel alone or unloved. And besides,” he laughed tearfully. “Who would rile up Lord Connington if you left my side?” 

She chortled with him, tears in her own purple eyes. 

“I am sorry,” he said. He was the reason she had no children of her own, a husband to call her own. He was the reason she felt the way she did. 

“For what, my dear?” 

“For being such a burden...for being the reason why you feel as if you’ve lost seventeen years of your life.” 

Her eyes widened and Ashara rose shakily to her knees and held his face in her hands. “You have never been a burden, Egg. Never, not once. I did not lose seventeen years of my life. Being your Ma Ashara has been the honour of my life. When I left Westeros I was broken, I-” She kissed his brow and held him tight. “You have never been a burden,” she reiterated as she sat back down. “You were the son I never had. I lost my child but I gained you. I will never take Elia’s place but I have loved you as I would have loved any child of my own body. Raising you filled a hole in my own heart, my lovely boy. When we place you on that throne, Elia will not be the only one whose heart will be filled with pride. Mine will too. My boy will be king.” A tear slid down her cheek.

“I didn’t know you had a child.” 

“I didn’t _have_ one...I lost it before I could...here.” She looked up at the Stone Drum Tower that loomed over everything in Dragonstone. 

“I am sorry.” 

“It’s in the past.” 

“Was it Lord Stark’s?” When she shot him a puzzled look he explained, “Arianne says the two of you were in love...that people talk of your doomed love.” 

She removed the leaves from a new bunch of berries. “Arianne should stop listening to gossip.” 

“Is it true though?” he asked testily. “Were you in love?” 

“We were little more than children. It was a passing fancy, nothing more. It was all so long ago. He probably doesn’t even remember me.” She returned to her cranberries. 

Egg narrowed his eyes. “How did you meet?” 

“Harrenhal.”

“And…”

“Lord Walter Whent threw a feast every night of the tourney. It was almost enough to make us forget the hurt of how your grandfather scarpered Rhaegar’s plans for a council...well until Rhaegar did what he did. I danced every night until my feet grew sore only to do it all over again the next night. Not a song ended but I had a new partner asking me to dance. Jon Connington laughed a lot more back then too. He even danced. Can you believe that? Anyway, the night before the tourney started Lord Whent hosted us in his small hall. It was a small gathering. Your grandfather, fortunately for all involved, declined the invitation. That night ours was a dejected gathering washed down with copious amounts of wine. At some point Rhaegar began playing his harp and Richard Lonmouth started banging on the tables and we all began to dance. I danced with Oberyn and Os and Myles Mooton. I even danced with Jon, twice! Like I said, he was a lot more fun then. At some point I stepped away from the dance floor clutching a stitch in my side. I thought I might just expire if I didn’t get some air and the gardens were blissfully quiet. I kept walking further into them when I heard someone call out, ‘ _My lady,’_ after me. ‘ _You dropped this,’_ he said. It was an earring my mother had gifted me when I first left for court. I’d just given him my thanks when Arthur called out for me. Distracted as I was, I barely managed a nod at Arthur to let him know I heard him. When I returned my attention to the man, he’d already begun to walk away. It was Arthur who told me his name was Ned Stark. He was Lord Arryn’s ward and a foster brother of Robert Baratheon.”

“Then?” 

“That was it.” 

“That is not it!” Egg protested petulantly. 

“Fine,” she said laughing just as she always did when he asked for one more story as a child. “The night the tourney opened we had a proper feast with proper music and not just the banging of tables. I danced with Oberyn again and Arthur and Jon. I spotted the man from the night before early on. He’d look at me when he thought I couldn’t see him and when our eyes met he’d look away only for me to catch him again. So I took to playing a game with him. Each time I caught him looking at me I’d wink at him and he’d grow as red as a beet.” She began to chuckle. “His brother, Brandon, saw me at one point and threw his head back in laughter when he realised what was happening. Before I knew it he stood in front of me. He kissed my hand and asked me for a dance...with his brother. If it was possible for a man to die of mortification Ned Stark might have died that night. He apologised profusely to me and every time a new apology crossed his lips I laughed some more. Anyway…” she said with a fading smile. “That is how I met Ned Stark. Like I said, it was a passing fancy.” 

“Were you referring to yourself…When Arianne first joined us, you told me that many a shy man has won the heart of a woman like Arianne.”

“Did I say such a thing?” 

Egg nodded. 

“It is a wisdom as old as time itself.” 

Egg narrowed his eyes at her. “I don’t believe you.” 

She flicked the water in the bowl at him with her fingers. 

She was right, he did like her cranberry pie. Egg sat in the kitchens as she baked the pie. Dragonstone’s kitchens were fashioned like a curled up dragon with vents for the smoke and heat in its nostrils. The old cook there said he had known his father since he was a boy even younger than Egg. He’d known Rhaenys too and his mother. Egg had met many people who still lived on the island all of whom seemed to know his family. Each had a tale that helped him feel more rooted to this land. 

They had just left the kitchens with Ser Oswell when Ashara squealed. She clapped her hands together and held them under her chin, tilting her head to look at a man who stood beside Ser Arthur. It was a man Egg had never seen before. He was clearly a Salty Dornishman but unlike any Egg had seen before the man’s face was freckled. 

Gleefully, Ashara asked, “Aron is that really you?” before she ran to him. He caught her and spun her around. 

“Aron Santagar?” Ser Oswell echoed. 

“No,” the man said dramatically. “Not you too!” He looked at Arthur, at Ashara and back at Ser Oswell. “No!” His chuckle was light and laced with a hum of amusement and disbelief. “I must be dreaming.. I do not believe this.” 

“Ser Aron!” Arianne cheeped from behind him before rushing to greet the guest it seemed everyone knew. Tyene and Nym were not far behind her. 

“You rascal you, you’re still alive!” Even Jon Connington knew this man. 

“I must be dead,” the man declared. “Either that or I have been granted the ability to see both the living and the dead.” 

“Egg,” Arianne smiled. “This is Ser Aron Santagar, the Red Keep’s Master of Arms and brother to the Lord of Spottswood.” 

“Has he nothing but snow between his ears?” Oberyn rubbed his eyes. “Why would he forewarn the woman?” 

They sat around The Conqueror’s Painted Table. More than fifty feet long, Aegon’s carpenters had shaped it after Westeros, sawing out each bay and peninsula of the land with its rivers and mountains, castles and cities, lakes and forests. Egg sat on the chair positioned in the precise place Dragonstone occupied off the coast of Westeros. Around him were his family - those who raised him and those who shared his blood...and the Spider’s messenger: Ser Aron Santagar, Doran Martell’s chief spy in the Red Keep. Though the Golden Company were now his men, these were the people he trusted most. He would learn what Ser Aron had to say and choose what he later disclosed.

Robert Baratheon was dead as was his brother Renly. So too was Lady Stark. The Imp was free and Lord Stark in chains for treason. 

“He would have wanted to save the children. He blamed himself for not saving Aegon and Rhaenys,” Ashara explained. The words seemed to take the air and ire out of Oberyn. “He blamed himself for extorting his sister to marry Robert Baratheon. Had he not, he believed so much strife could have been avoided.”

“It wouldn’t have stopped that fool, Brandon, from thinking he could storm the Red Keep,” answered Jon Connington, once Hand of a King.

“But he believed Lady Lyanna would not have felt the need to follow Rhaegar.”

“Rhaegar thought the two of them were fated. He would have married her whether she was promised to Robert Baratheon or not.”

“That is the truth of it, brother. But not the truth Ned Stark sees. He is a man who has raised a nephew in hiding from the man he loved most. Had he spoken to Robert before he did Cersei, he knew the man would kill the children, innocents.”

“What he should have done is not accept Robert’s request.”

“As you did Aerys’?”

“He accepted,” Uncle Oberyn expounded, “not for love of Robert but of Jon Arryn.”

Ser Aron then went on to tell them of the events that unfolded following Robert’s death. He told them of how Cersei had Renly Baratheon killed for trying to find a Tyrell queen for Robert. His companion Ser Loras Tyrell was badly injured. Cersei feared the power and strength in men and coin the Tyrells would give Renly, the man next in line for the throne after Stannis. She now proclaimed that the Lord of Storm’s End and Knight of the Flowers were felled by outlaws against whom she vowed revenge. She apparently made a great show of mourning her good brother all while lining up her second son for Storm’s End.

“Storm’s End belongs to Shireen.”

Ser Aron Santagar laughed mirthlessly. “I do not believe such things matter to a woman like Cersei Lannister. She did after all kill it’s rightful lord. A young girl to such a woman is an afterthought.” 

Aegon couldn’t help but think back to the woman he saw in Winterfell. The beautiful woman with the wretched heart and the scowl. _She is no Naerys._

Ser Aron also told them of how Lord Stark planned to hold the throne for Stannis upon Robert’s death and how he had trusted a man named Littlefinger to get him the gold cloaks and their two thousand swords. 

“Who is Littlefinger?” Jon Connington looked around at the table. 

“Lord Petyr Baelish. The Master of Coin,” answered Ser Aron.

“Baelish.” Ser Oswell Whent pronounced thoughtfully, tasting the word, weighing it. “Lord Hoster had a ward named Baelish. He the one?”

“Yes, ser.”

“How did _he_ become Master of Coin? His own father did not have two pennies to rub together. They had a little jut of rock somewhere in...yes, The Fingers. Lord Hoster spoke of doing the boy’s father a favour fostering his son.” Despite the side he took in the rebellion, Lord Hoster Tully had been married to Minisa Whent, Ser Oswell’s older cousin.

“Jon Arryn gave him a small sinecture in customs upon his wife’s request. He rose in power and influence over time.”

“Why would he betray Ned? What had Ned done to him?”

“The man owns whore houses,” Oberyn denoted. “And Ned Stark wanted to claim the throne for Stannis - a man who wanted them outlawed. The man had good business sense.”

Ashara’s mouth opened slightly as if she was about to speak, and then closed again. She fixed her eyes on Oberyn’s profile, as if deep in thought. Then she blinked, refocused and said, “Ned would not trust a man who owned a brothel.”

“He did,” Ser Aron said, “because his wife called the man brother.”

Ashara pursed her lips.

“To hear the way Shella told it when we visited the God’s Eye with Rhaegar and Lady Lyanna, the boy was half in love with Catelyn Tully.”

“Is he the one who duelled with Brandon Stark?” Arthur asked.

“Aye. Duelling for a woman’s hand _is_ a tad past fraternal.”

“You’re telling me this man brought about Ned Stark’s downfall for a woman?” Jon Connington asked, unbelieving. 

“Why so surprised, Jon?” Oberyn scoffed. “How many wars have been fought over a woman?”

“Whatever his feelings for Lady Stark,” Ser Aron stated. “As Prince Oberyn says, his decision seems to have been guided more by his hate of Stannis than by his love of Lady Stark. When Lord Stark declared for Stannis, and ordered the queen escorted to her rooms the Gold Cloaks turned on Lord Stark and killed all his men. Littlefinger subdued him himself with the dagger sent to kill his son. The Lannister men then went on to kill all of Lord Stark’s household.”

“And the girls?” Arianne quivered with fear in her voice. “Sansa and Arya.”

“Lady Sansa is being held in Maegor’s Holdfast. She had written a letter to her brother asking him to come south-“

“He won’t,” Oberyn interjected. “Ethan Glover will see right through that after everything he’s seen in the south. The boy's uncle died there with his grandfather and now his father rots in the black cells. If I know those Northern lords at all, Robb Stark _will_ come down but with the entire north at his back and not to bend the knee. The northerners would gladly die for their lord.” Oberyn paused pensively. “And against the Lannisters, we could find common cause.”

“They will hear you have landed Egg,” Arianne said. “Let them hear from us what we have in common. They have no love for Targaryens, I know. But the time has come for them to know the truth of Jon. Robert Baratheon is dead. He cannot harm him any more and together we could crush Tywin Lannister and his golden whelps. Aunt Elia can explain, Lord Glover too. Better still, let me go. Let me take Ser Arthur or Ser Oswell or Ser Gerold, anyone who was at the Tower of Joy. Let them see them alive...let them see their lord let them live...let them know Lyanna chose Rhaegar. Tell them you regret what your grandfather did, and that you will stand with them in their hour of need.”

Oberyn’s smile widened as she spoke. “She is right,” he began before he paused and furrowed his brow. “Aron, what of the little one...Arya? She would have broken her own fingers before she wrote anything of the kind. What news have you of her?”

“Lord Stark’s younger daughter...is missing.”

“Missing?” Oberyn’s face pulled into a scowl. 

“Lord Varys continues to search for her but she disappeared the day her father was arrested...Lord Stark got her a Braavosi master to teach her water dancing. When the Lannisters came for her, the Braavosi held back the men until she escaped. But that is not to say she survived. There was a slaughter that day and there is every chance she lost her life in the chaos. The girl is said to have scarcely dressed in finery and she was not well known in court. Perhaps they killed her without knowing who she was.” 

Silence reigned over the room. Egg thought back at the last time he saw her, at how she demanded to show him how well she learnt to fight over the years. He thought of his brother who said he had never known a life without her. Egg wondered how he would take this news. Egg had scarcely known Arya himself. He’d only met her thrice in his life, the first time as a boy of seven. Yet he had felt so taken in by her that he shared his life’s greatest secret with her, a burden she seemed to carry without ever betraying his trust. He looked at Arianne who held her head in her hands, at Tyene who stared blankly at the wall, and at Nym who had her eyes closed. She whispered something he could not hear. Arya seemed to have meant something to each one of them. 

“If they killed her,” Uncle Oberyn said, “They would not have done so mistakenly. I have known that girl since before she could walk and even with her last breaths she would give them a tongue lashing that began and ended with her being a Stark of Winterfell. If she is dead, it is because they murdered her just as they did Rhaenys.” 

“Cersei seems to genuinely be looking for her so if she was killed, I assure you the Lannister woman is not aware.” 

“Is there any chance she made it out of the castle?” 

“Lord Varys is looking for her day and night. Cersei Lannister has closed the city gates to ensure the girl cannot escape. How long can a noble girl last alone in the streets of King’s Landing?"

“They called her Arya Underfoot in Winterfell,” Nym said. “Perhaps she could.” 

“If the city gates are closed, how did you get out?” Egg inquired. 

“Lord Varys has his way, my prince.” 

“Then we will need his talents once more,” Oberyn Martell announced as he stood. He walked away to gaze out at the sea. “Him and that smuggler too. The Lannisters are not the only ones who pay their debts.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the books Ser Aron Santagar dies in the bread riot in King’s Landing when Myrcella is being escorted to Dorne. I’m wearing my tin foil when I wonder why the Red Keep has a Dornish Master of Arms given how mad Dorne is over what happened to Elia and the babies. Sylva Santagar is also one of Arianne’s best friends. Then there’s Doran’s words in AFFC/ADWD (I can’t remember which book) when he talks about Dorne still having friends in the Red Keep. I’m going with him having his own spies in the castle and Aron being one of them. I also just wanted to get him out of King’s Landing before everything goes to crap under Cersei. 
> 
> You’ll also notice Maester Cressen is still kicking around - just about. Call me captain-save-a-tertiary-character lol. 😆
> 
> I also wanted to concentrate on how Ashara would feel back in Westeros. Ethan, Elia and Ned all suffered because of the war but they built lives for themselves. I don’t doubt life on the run healed some parts of Ashara. She had her brother for one and I’d like to think she thinks of Os and Jon Con as family too but for team Essos, life seems to have been on pause and I wanted to explore how at least one of them would feel being back. The Kingsguard swore off wives and children so I presume to them in the grand scheme of things they feel as if they are still doing their duty. We know our boy Jon Con is not into women anyway and has been living off dreams of war crimes. Being back to him is a dream come true. Haldon is a (half)maester, and Lemore is a septa but Ashara could have gotten married, had children, been someone else and she’s not. Oh and she’s in the very castle where she lost her child.


	32. Ethan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mini chapter that starts when Elia is crying in her dark room after news of Egg arrives.

**Ethan**

A numbness washed over him heaving him down as if he were drowning, eyes dead, limbs weighed down. He set his dead eyes to the shape of her. She was slumped on the floor like a broken doll hugging herself. Her breath was even though she whimpered intermittently in her sleep. 

Then suddenly, “Ethan,” he heard her call out barely louder than a whisper. She must have heard him move. Part of him, the part that had been her husband for the past sixteen years wanted to rush over to her, take her in his arms and hold her, but the other part, the hurt, angry, humiliated part rooted him to his spot. The woman he loved more than life itself had played him for a fool for nearly two decades. That dark part of him wanted to make her hurt, to make her cry out for all the pain she caused him. 

She had introduced her son to him as a nephew. He had hosted her family, including every single one of her brothers’ children in his home for a year at a time. _Hells, I called her son, son._ He had liked the boy, had admired how much he wanted to learn of the north and of how Ethan ruled his lands. He should have known. The purple eyes. He looked just like his father. 

As for Elia, he had made her his world; a woman who was greater than even his wildest dreams. He tried to make a home in the north for her, built her a sept, spent a year in Dorne with her when she was too sick for a northern winter. He even gave up hope of children when they were expected of the Lord of Deepwood Motte. _My brothers are my heirs,_ he repeated each time. His heirs now had heirs of their own, House Glover would survive, but he did not want to be without her. All the while, she saw him for nothing more than a fool. Had it all been a game? All of it? Was he a pawn on her board? One she moved around whenever she required? Was his payment the castle she paid for? When they married, Deepwood Motte was little more than a wooden hall. It was no Winterfell now, but it was a stronger fortress than it had ever been in the history of House Glover. Was this payment, blood money of sorts? 

Her dry, racking sobs filled the air of the room they had shared all these years. He envied her for her tears, he struggled to feel anything. Though the sound of her crying seemed to strike him in the heart. Still, he could not bring himself to respond to her. Wordlessly he stood, and left the room. He needed some time away from her, away from her lies... and from his love for her. 

He sorely wanted to talk to his brothers of it but the words seemed to stick in his throat, choking him. With no words to share, he locked himself in his solar and opted for ale to wash down his degradation. _There isn’t enough ale for this._

Why her lies surprised him he could not say. The woman would have been queen. What _was_ surprising was that he had expected her to truly choose him, lord of a castle at the edge of the north without getting anything out of it. The marriage was intended to be a degradation for her. _The princess who married a minor lord_ . _Except,_ he thought bitterly, _this princess has been plotting all along._

What he couldn’t make sense of was how she kept up her game for so long. _What if she wasn’t playing?_ In the early days, after the war, he bore his soul to her. One night, he sobbed against her unceasingly about his regrets and the nightmares he still had about the way Brandon and Lord Rickard had lost their lives and the guilt he felt. All his friends had died with them, Kyle Royce was gone, Elbert Arryn with him and Jeffory Mallister did not lag behind them for long. Ethan should have died with them and did not. He had sobbed against her until his tears soaked through her shift. Elia held him that night and so many nights after. She couldn’t have been playing him then. _Could she?_ She shared her own ghosts with him and over the years leaned on him as much as he did her. 

Despite his fury, his heart wrenched in pain when he recalled the haunted look she had in her eyes the first time he saw her after the fall of King’s Landing. He had been freed from the black cells when Ned arrived. She was running after Ned barefoot to the throne room. Princess Rhaenys had looked asleep but when Ethan’s eyes fell upon the baby, he had to turn away. He had been battered beyond recognition. “I couldn’t save my Rhaenys but I had a chance to save my boy. I could not risk his life,” she said. 

“I didn’t want to force you to choose between your lord and I,” she told him. “You would follow Ned Stark to the end of the world, even if it was to fight my son for Robert.” _It would never come to that._ Ned proved the truth of it with his actions, and paid for it with his own blood. 

In some ways he understood her reasoning. He could not hide this from Ned but only because he knew his friend would make the right decision...Ned would not risk her child when he raised another son of Rhaegar himself. They were preparing for war, to protect her after all, and he knew, if it came to it, that Ned would not allow an innocent child to be harmed... _except this child might not be innocent for long._ Elia clearly wanted her son on his grandfather’s throne, _the_ _grandfather who had burnt my lord._ That was a rebellion in the making, in that case, he wondered whether she might have been right in choosing to keep her plans for her son hidden. He would have no choice but to fight behind Ned, and Ned behind his king.

Now his men would look to him for guidance. What was he to say to them? _Your lady has a son with a price on his head...a son she hid from us all._ What kind of man did that make him? _A man who has no idea what goes on inside his home._ What was the difference between him and a cuckold? He was just as clueless. 

Though his throat felt drier than a summer in Dorne, he poured himself another mug of the burning liquid, its bitterness seemed a warming companion to his own. He emptied that mug too, as if he would find an answer on what to do at the bottom of the mug and when that failed, he sought for it in the next mug-full until his thoughts went from incongruous to senseless. 

_Why am I seeking an answer?_ He asked himself when he lost count of how much he drank. He had no choice to make. They had already come to the end of the road. Why would she stay with him now? Her secret was out, she could return to her brothers and her son now. 

He woke the next morning reeking, with a head splitting ache, cracked lips and a dry throat. When he stood he swayed, lost his balance and sank back down into his seat. 

\---

They rode out of Deepwood Motte two days later, just after dawn with just under fifty of his own men. He picked up another fifty from Houses Wood and Bole in the Wolfswood. They stopped on the fourth night at Ironrath, home of House Forrester when he saw Elia swaying on her horse. Why she insisted on riding he did not know. He’d had a litter readied for her. 

Though they were still yet to speak, he kept an eye on her at all times, a protective shadow. When she wasn’t looking, he’d sweep his gaze across the curve of her thighs, suppressing the flash of desire that would surge through his loins and the longing in his heart for her with a gaze he all but wrenched away. When he ordered them to stop at Ironrath, though it would delay them further, she looked pale...anxious even. He wanted to go to her, to ask what ailed her, but found he was still too angry. So, he ordered the men to stop and accepted the succour and respite offered by Rodrik Forrester’s holdfast. 

“You’ve still not spoken to her.” 

“It’s you.” Ethan turned to his youngest brother. Robett rode by Elia’s side and seemed to be the only person she spoke to since they left Deepwood Motte, bar Lyanna’s boy and Jory Casell. 

“Yes,” he shrugged. “It’s me, your brother.” Robett leaned against the wall, appraising him and it seemed from his face that he found him lacking. “You are miserable and so is she. What will you do about it?” He raised an expectant eyebrow at him. “You walk around as if you have been gutted and she as if she were a wilted rose-”

“What is there to say? She has lied to us all.” 

“She wanted to tell you-”

Ethan scoffed. “She had sixteen years...it’s funny that she was just about to tell me just when the news arrived.” 

“She has been asking you to go away with her for months!”  
Ethan sighed loudly. It wasn’t enough. She had deceived him for years and he couldn’t find it in himself to forgive that no matter how much his brother spoke in her favour. “It’s too late,” he said, even as he silently hoped it wasn’t. 

“It is not,” his brother argued sagely. “Do not lose her because of your pride.” 

“My pride?” he laughed bitterly. “I have no pride left. Once everyone finds out, I will have no standing. _The man fooled by his wife,_ that is all I will ever be now.” 

“The truth is what you make it.”

Ethan narrowed his eyes. 

“No one has to know you did not know. Tell Ned the truth. He’s the one preparing us for a war to protect _your_ wife. _Your_ duty. You owe no one else any explanation. You protected your wife’s son. That is all anyone has to know.”  
“She wants to put him on the throne.”

“There’s a long way between wanting something and achieving it, Ethan. Ned has made overtures to Doran Martell. We know nothing of what he will say. But right now your wife wastes away. She needs you.” 

Ethan left his brother where he was, unwilling to speak further about the matter at hand. 

He found her leaning over the parapet. He yanked her back. 

“Wh-” She started to say before she gasped at seeing him.

“You shouldn’t do that,” he said, flailing for something to say. “It’s too dangerous.” 

She regarded him intently. “And you would care?” He couldn’t read the look in her eyes but her folded arms did not seem to invite further conversation. 

“You’ve been weeping.” Her eyes were red and the hastily wiped tracks were still visible down her cheeks. “Why?”

“Why?” she laughed unbelievingly. “Because my husband cannot stand to see me. Because I have lost the one man I have ever truly loved and I have no one to blame but myself. Because Robert wants to kill my child, because my brothers prepare themselves for war and I have no idea what will become of them, because a man I consider my friend is surrounded by lions who are not beyond killing a good person... I weep because I am helpless to do anything for any of them,” she added with a mutter, turning her back to him. 

His hand moved towards her, but he seemed to leave it too late–she had already turned on her heel, and began speeding off like a deer in flight. 

He wheeled away as well, seeking to find himself a pallet for the night...her words heavy on his mind. 

“Ethan...wait.” 

Against better judgment he turned around to find her running back to him. Angry as he may be, he wanted her...he wanted her to talk to him...to explain. He wanted her to try and be the one to show him, as his brother said, that it was not too late. But it was. It had to be. Yet he stood, awaiting what she said next. 

“What happens next?” she asked, arms folded. 

“We stop at Winterfell, ask for news about Ned and then we-”

“To us” she clarified softly. “ _With_ us.” 

“Was there ever an us, princess?” He jeered scornfully, despite his longing for her. “There was you and there was me and there was your game.” 

“You’re right.”

“What?”

“You are right. It is my fault. I have destroyed us. You know I could blame my brothers, or Varys for doing this to us-“

“Varys?”

“Who do you think saved Aegon?” she asked. “It was his idea to replace Aegon with the baby who died in my arms that day. Rhaenys’ face was well known but no one pays attention to a baby. He saved my child. And yes, he stayed loyal to me as atonement for his actions in thwarting Rhaegar and the misery that befell us all. He kept an eye on what happened at court and he told my brothers of what happened. But you have to believe me, Ethan. I had no idea that my brothers and Varys would concoct such a ploy. My instructions to Varys were to look out for Ned, not to risk him...though even my brothers would not have foreseen what happened between Catelyn and the Lannister Imp.” She sighed for a moment and moved closer to him. “When I last saw Oberyn I promised to tell you the truth. For sixteen years, these lies have weighed heavily on me. Perhaps my brothers thought that I had already spoken to you. Perhaps they didn’t. But it is my doing and my failure that has brought us here.” Her eyes grew glassy with tears. “I wanted to tell you so many times. I was faced with an impossible choice: my son or my husband. And I was selfish. I wanted you both.”

She raised a hand to silence him when he opened his mouth to speak. 

“It’s true, when I came north to marry, I did not harbour any hopes of finding love. I came here to build an armada for my son and the lumber of the north’s great forests was a place for me to start. I betrothed my son to my niece, Arianne, when he was too small to understand what I had done. Arianne’s grandfather had no cause to support my son but he had every reason to fund his own granddaughter’s path to becoming the Queen of Westeros. I am a traitor to the man you call king but loyal to my own, my son. The child Robert would see dead. I do not regret wanting to place my child in his rightful place, not after everything they did to me and my son and the years they have robbed me of. But I do regret hurting you. I have betrayed you, I know, but the one thing that has never been false is how I feel about you.” Her chin trembled as tears began to stream down her cheeks. “Of course, you have no reason to believe me.” She huffed a laugh filled with sarcasm. “Why should you? But it is the truth. Ethan Glover, I love you, I have loved you and always will until the day I die. But,” she straightened herself, wiping the tears off her cheeks again. “I lied to you. I was your wife and you deserved nothing but truth from me. So,” she gulped audibly and folded her hands into fists. 

Elia Martell rubbed her eyes and cleared her throat. “So,” she exhaled long and wearily. “You will no longer have to trouble yourself on my account. I will no longer blight your life. Perhaps we should have been married by a septon…” She added with a wistful smile. “Then you could get yourself an annulment on the grounds that I could give you no children.”

His heart seemed to stop at her words - a problem his gut seemed not to face soaring as it did, first to his throat and then crashing to his feet. He stepped back for a moment, dazed and uncomprehending of what she was saying. The shock seemed to rob him of words. 

“But I would wager that you wouldn’t be the first northman to set aside a barren, unfaithful, wife. And if you find yourself no such precedent, I do not doubt that you will find some man from your ancestors who had more than one wife. I’m sure some maester or other will find you the proof.”

“Elia-“

“As for me,” she continued, raising her voice and speeding on. “As for me...” Her voice broke. She cleared her throat and clenched her jaw, as if she was preparing herself to wrench the words out of herself. 

He stepped toward her, and put a hand on each of her shoulders. 

“Elia…”

“As for me,” she tried again. “I appreciate Ned’s concern. I suppose I will never have a truer friend. I will never be able to pay his debt nor yours but I will not put Howland Reed at risk because of my actions, or pull the north into a war that does not concern you. When we get to Winterfell, all I ask is you see me on to a ship for Dorne. I never wanted to choose,” she told him with a sad smile. “But it would seem my choice is made for me. Robert wants my son dead, and he wants me. My place is beside my son. And if I must die, I suppose I should die beside my child.” She moved out of his hold. “I am sorry,” she told him tearily. “For the hurt I have caused you. I will never be able to give you back the last sixteen years but I will not stand in the way of your happiness. You deserve a woman who will not betray you.”

“Elia…”

“Goodnight, Lord Glover.” 

Ethan stood there watching his wife fade away into the dark night, lost for words. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, long time no see! Life has been super busy, I’ve struggled to find time to write. I didn’t actually intend to write this weekend. In fact, this chapter wasn’t in my outline but I had a comment from a lovely reader asking for an update yesterday so I thought I’d deliver something... even if it’s teeny, tiny. I felt for my boy Ethan so I chose him as a muse. They haven’t gotten to Winterfell yet so don’t know who’s arrested, dead, missing.
> 
> The good news is, it seems to have inspired me to write. If all works out I’m hoping to get out an actually planned Elia chapter out this weekend. Then we have a Jon (probably next week) then an Arya or Ned (I haven’t decided which to do first) they happen concurrently so let me know who you want to hear from first.


	33. Elia

**Elia**

Elia’s place fell in the middle of their now sizable party. She was flanked on one side by Jory Cassel and on the other by Jon and his faithful companion, the white, ever growing pup, Ghost. Her own constant companion, her good-brother Robett rode ahead with his own brother today, leaning across to him intermittently in low words she could not make out. Words that looked serious nonetheless. 

In the cold light of day she came to regret her words to Ethan the night before. _Perhaps I should have not suggested an annulment,_ she reflected soberly. _It’s not like he stopped me,_ another part of her retorted wryly. It must have been something he was considering. Since they spoke, whenever he saw her he would divert his attentions elsewhere. After days of trying to make him see her, she finally gave up after the previous night when foolishly she decided to tell him all she could without losing the threadbare hold she had on herself. For a moment, when he stayed instead of leaving her, a flurry of hope rushed through her, quickly depressing itself to dejection. She had ended their marriage herself. 

_Perhaps now he would know what it meant to be a father._ She could not help but wonder who he would marry next, scouring each prospect before she settled on soft-spoken Medger Cerwyn’s homely daughter. Aged two-and-thirty, Jonelle Cerwyn could still give him children and would tie House Glover and House Cerwyn. With his ties to the Hornwoods and his control of vast swathes of the Wolfswood and its natural riches, the marriage would further strengthen his standing in the north. _Let the trade with the Free Cities be my wedding present to them,_ she thought with unjust bitterness. This _was_ her doing after all. 

Though thinking of a life without her husband turned her knees to water, she could not let it be her only concern. In some respects, she was grateful news of her son was out in the open now. Whatever came next, she would stand proudly behind his cause. The fuse had been lit and they would either burn with the fire of their own making or turn their enemies to ash. _At least it would come to an end._ She had carried her burdens for the past seventeen years and though she would never be free of the loss of Rhaenys or her uncle Lewyn, she hoped to see justice done to Tywin even if she had to suffice herself with never being the one to bring down Robert herself. Many a night she wondered who she hated more. The man who ordered her children dead or the one who revelled in her loss? Never having quite found the answer herself she reminded herself that sometimes the rabble killed the king on the cyvasse board but only the dragon annihilated the elephant, the power behind the king. And if it took Cersei Lannister killing the king so many seemed to rally behind, to place her bastard on the throne, she would accept it as a step to seeing the destruction of the woman’s father. Doran had told her many a time that they would destroy the man and his legacy. Oberyn called Robert the sacrifice they would have to make in this cause - words that she knew were not his own. After the loss of Rhaenys, Oberyn had been baying for blood. Seeing him, their old septon commented that Oberyn was living proof of the goodness of the gods. “If the gods were cruel,” he said, “they would have made Oberyn your mother’s firstborn, and Doran her third. Alas, we are grateful here that cooler heads prevail.” Were Oberyn the Prince of Dorne they would have gone down in a blaze of glory years ago, though they would have taken their enemies with them. Doran’s way was slow and steady and in this instance she was happy to defer to him. More a father than a brother sometimes, she appreciated the calming effect he seemed to have on her wilder brother and felt comforted in the knowledge that to the best of his ability, his cautious nature would safeguard her son. He had proven it with his ploy to ascertain the position Ned Stark would take before he returned her son home. She just wished it would not have left the lord who had become her friend so vulnerable. Though, the more she thought about it, the more she softened in the fury she felt for her brothers. They were not the reason why Jaime Lannister attacked Ned in the streets. Even they could not have foreseen the beginnings of the burgeoning war Catelyn Stark’s actions had started. The Old Lion, last she heard, was raising an army to get back his son. And with that act, Tywin Lannister may end up giving her the thing she wanted most - her son, her husband, and the man she called friend on the same side. Robert would die and once he did, Ned would owe the Lannisters no allegiance once news of the children came out. She only hoped her brother’s promise to take care of Stannis Baratheon and Varys’ vow to handle Renly came to fruition before then. When guilt rose up in her, she reminded herself that they would see her son dead as well.

All that fell to her now was to prepare herself for what came next. That and to worry about what may have already come to pass beyond her ken. Chief among those concerns was her son. Had he returned? Was he safe? Whether Stannis lived or not, there would be a battle and though she knew her brother, Arthur, Os or Ser Gerold would not let him come to harm, she would have once sworn that her uncle would have returned to her after the Trident with Rhaegar but he had perished along with Ser Jonothor Darry and his prince. As she rode her palfrey she could not help but think that while she was preparing herself for a coming victory, her son could be dead, just as her once husband had been while she prayed for his return if only so he could free her from his mad father. _This is different_ she told herself. _I would know if my child had come to harm._ A mother always knew. _I will get news soon._ They would be at Winterfell the next day and she would learn more there, and if not there, it wouldn’t be long until she returned to Dorne. 

Like her, the North seemed to be holding its breath waiting for news about their lord. That he had asked Ethan and Ser Helman Tallhart to send men to man Moat Cailin was by now spreading through the land. Even if people did not know why, they knew that a winter of a different making was coming upon them. They simply waited on edge to see what winds it brought. 

Thoughts of Winterfell also brought Ned Stark to mind. In many respects she thought no one in the world would understand her plight better than the man who had once saved her life. Here he was, concerning himself with her needs and risking his own life just as he had that day in the Throne Room when Robert ordered him to put down her children’s bodies. It was from her that Ned had sought his cue and she did not doubt in the ensuing years that if she was to insist on leaving with her children, Ned would have defied the man-who-would-be-king because it was the right thing to do. _How funny is life,_ she thought. All those years ago, when Ashara spoke of her northern man, Elia could never have imagined in her wildest dreams that the same man would not only save her life but become her closest ally. In those days, she associated the name Stark with her own humiliation at Harrenhal. Now, she wondered how he fared and wanted to speak to him as soon as she could, to apologise...to explain. He would understand her she knew... she hoped. He too had lied to the world to protect the boy he called son; a child who now rode with her impatiently, keen to return to Winterfell, to stand with the boys he knew to be his brothers and to act in response to the harm that befell the man he called father. 

Ethan Glover’s next order did little to abate the boy’s impatience. He stopped their march to make camp for the night. Despite the momentary pinch in Jon’s expression, he obeyed the order moving along with the men to begin to make camp. She knew that once he did, he would return to her side, dutiful boy that he was. Ever since they left Deepwood Motte, whether they camped in the woods or in a holdfast, Jon never slept far from her, keeping an eye on her at all times.

Elia herself was grateful for the stop. She was shivering so hard she could scarcely keep hold of her palfrey. _Soon I will be in Dorne,_ she thought. _Then I will be complaining of cooking in the sun but better that than fingers that would drop off in spring. In the meantime, a spot beside the fire wouldn’t go amiss._

As the sun went down, the orange fires of their camp became bright and lively, spotlights against the darkening sky. At her own fire, the flames licked nervously at the wood, red sparks dancing but not quite taking hold, as if too shy to do so. Soon though, it seemed to find its confidence growing until the heat finally began to warm her. Suddenly, Jon, Robett, and Jory Cassel all stood up from where they sat around the small fire. She turned around to see, to her surprise, her husband walking toward her. 

Silently, he sat beside her, and handed her some hardbread, salt beef and a cup of hot cider. “You were shivering,” he said, draping his cloak around her shoulders. He said nothing else after the grunt he made when she gave him her thanks. The noises around them were not their own. Horses, men, dogs, the few cows they brought with them for the men once they reached Moat Cailin but no further noise from her husband interrupted the crackling fire between them. 

The silence waxed between them as they ate. She let it continue until she could bear it no more. “Do you-”

“You are not going to Dorne,” he said at the same time. 

She cocked her head to the side sceptically, outrage beginning to bubble inside her. “I do not recall asking your permission.” Elia sounded petulant even to her own ears. “I only asked you for your help, not your leave, my lord.” She had no notion of how she would navigate the choppy waters of the White Knife alone but she would go to her son and her brothers with or without his aid - she would prefer the former, however, if only because it guaranteed her getting to her destination faster. 

“Seeing as you are _my_ wife,” he snapped stonily, “you _do_ require my leave to leave my lands and I do not give you such permission.” 

“I will not be your wife for long, my lord, so-” 

“You _are_ my wife,” he bit out lowly, grabbing her arm forcefully, only loosening the hold when he saw her wince. “And whether I like it or not, it is a sacrament that binds you to me for life. I do not give you leave to put yourself in harm's way and I will brook no other argument. You are mine to protect-”

“And my son is mine!” Her voice carried louder than she intended she realised too late. The men around the nearby fires all looked over at them. Ethan stood then and yanked her up, dragging her further into the wood in silence. Even as her own ire rose up, she couldn’t help but smile internally at his insistence not to let her leave. _Does he still want me? Or is he doing this to punish me?_ Whether he did or did not mattered little however, not now, not when her son’s campaign had already begun...or would soon. 

He marched her further into the wood until they were so far from camp that the only source of light was the full moon above. 

“Stop!” she snarled trying and failing to wrench herself from his hold. The man handled a greatsword almost as tall as her with little effort, how she thought she’d overpower him she did not know. Not that it stopped her from kicking at his heels and snapping at him. “Say what you have to say and be done with it.” 

“Fine,” he barked back at her, crouching low to face her. “I forbid you to leave.”

“You have little say in that, my lord. Besides,” she added. “You have acted as if you could not wait to be free of me for the past week, turning on your heels whenever you see me, ignoring me as if I do not exist. So be free of me, treacherous, unfaithful wife that I am! Grant your leave or do not, I will return to my child and to my brothers!” 

“Then I will have no choice but to tie you to your saddle and your horse to mine until I take you to Howland Reed myself.” 

“You would do no such thing!” 

“Would I not?” Elia could have sworn she saw a ghost of a mocking smirk flit across his lips. 

“Why?” she demanded hotly, close to tears as she recalled his description of her. _A would-be-queen who never stopped playing the game of thrones. “That’s all your type do isn’t it?_ He asked her. “ _Distrust, betray, deceive._ ” 

“Because,” he growled, pulling her flush against him. Even in the silver moonlight she saw colour rise to his face, a sign of his oncoming fury. “Damn me to the seven hells, I love you, Elia Martell!”

The confession, one she would have died for just days before, winded her now. As did the long, deep, hard crash of his lips against hers that left her weak-kneed and flailing to keep her feet. It seemed to work for him. The gentleness with which he laid her down on the forest floor was a clear contrast to the fury with which his not unwelcome tongue ravaged her mouth. If he could not speak his feelings, she would let his body talk for him. Hers had already begun to respond in involuntary sounds and clutching hands. Ethan rucked up her skirts and sheathed himself to the root inside her in one forceful thrust. He smelt of the road, of dust and sweat and horse and underneath it all, of him, his desperation and need and hurt. Arms now pinned above her head, Elia could only cry out and flutter against the unrelenting battering inside her. 

“You are my wife,” he growled against her ear as he continued unyieldingly. “You will not leave me.” 

_Yours,_ her body answered in rising hips that welcomed each intrusion, legs that wrapped around him like a vine and a cry of his name that answered the question he posed with each stroke inside her. His hands dropped down to her breasts, stroking and groping before he slid them further down to raise her so he could go even deeper inside her, stifling her answering scream with another bruising attack into her mouth, his beard bristling against her face. He seemed to have lost all sense but the ability to groan _mine_ against her ear. Elia arched into him meeting him thrust for thrust, drawing blood from his lips in frantic desperation to possess him body and soul before he ripped himself away from her the moment his senses returned. She threw her head back in euphoria as her husband set a punishing rhythm that struck the right balance between pleasure and pain like the act they threw themselves into to drown the pain they had caused each other. She dug her nails into his neck and back, raking him from nape to buttocks and spurring him on with hands that held him against her core, trying to pull him inside her, as if she could make them truly one. And when the fury began to make way for the senselessness that came with his upcoming release, he answered her attack with teeth on her neck that would no doubt mark his assault in the morning, rutting her wildly. Elia clawed and screamed, and begged. “Let go, my love,” she groaned against his ear. His resounding cry mingled with her own. 

He was heaving for breath when she finally returned to herself, still joined with him. 

“I suppose that was one way of warming you,” he commented with a wry grin that she thought she would never see again.

“You did promise to shelter me,” she responded with her own grin, as he removed himself from inside her. 

“Aye. I did.” He laced up his breeches before he returned his arms to her side to lift her up until she stood. “That is why I will not sacrifice you to the rage of Robert Baratheon.” All levity seemed to evaporate with those words. “He will not let your son live, Elia. Not if he rises against him. Nor will he suffer the men who follow him. And this time, no one would be able to save you if you rose with your son. I do not control your son or your brothers but _you_ are under my jurisdiction. I will not let you destroy yourself.” 

“I was Aegon’s mother long before I was your wife,” she said with gentle remonstrance, raising her hand and rubbing her thumb against the throbbing vein on the side of his head. “Ethan, I cannot hide in safety while my son fights for his birthright. I will not.” 

“He will lose.”  
“Perhaps he will.”  
“And if he dies?”

“Then I will die with him.”

“What of me?” he asked in a voice so soft it was almost a whisper. 

“You would marry a wide-hipped woman to breed,” she said smiling against reason. “One who would never betray you.” 

“Did you ever care for me?” 

“You know I did,” she said weakly. Scalding tears sprung up immediately, burning their way down her face. Words would never do justice to just how much she did. 

“You lied to me for years.” 

“And I hated myself for it.” She leaned her head against his chest and wrapped her arms around him. He did not return the gesture, nor did he tense or step away from her. She drew some strength from that. “I was serious last night, Ethan. I did not expect to fall for you quite as deeply as I did. I never intended to hurt you either,” she confessed. “You made me feel like a person in my own right, not just a mare created only to breed. You showed me that it was possible to be loved for me and not for what I brought.” She looked up to see tears glistening in his eyes. “You gave me a love far greater than I ever imagined could exist and I betrayed you. It will be my greatest regret. And leaving you is not easy for me.” The tears that threatened to fall in his eyes did then. “But Aegon is my son. I cannot hide away in Greywater Watch while he is hunted-” 

“What difference do you think you can make Elia?” he asked without malice. “You are but one woman.”

“I am his mother. I have had to live for years without him. The least I can do is die beside him.” 

“And damn the rest of us.” The bitterness seemed to return to him then. He removed her hands from around his midriff. 

“What would you have me do?” she pleaded. 

“I would have you stay. If not for me, then for Jon. At least for now, until we know more.”

“Jon?” 

“Robert wants Aegon’s head.” It was the first time, she realised, he had called him by his name. “He does so without knowing him to be the threat you mean him to be. That he is Rhaegar’s son is enough for him to call for his head, and yours. Ned knows that as well as you and I. We are not only taking you to Greywater Watch, Elia. We are taking Lyanna’s boy to safety as well. I gave Ned my oath to protect the boy. I have watched him this past week, Elia. The boy is barely containing a silent rage. If war is coming, and it is clear that it is - if it’s not your son’s war, we will be at war with the Lannisters before long - Ned will not forgive an attempt on his son or the killing of his men and the Old Lion will not abide by the insult to his House. When that war comes, who knows where Robert will fall? The Lannisters are his family now after all.”

 _They will kill him,_ she thought darkly. _And good riddance to him._

Ignorant of her musings, her husband continued. “When the war comes, the boy will not sit back. I have travelled with him, Elia. He has more than a young man’s hunger for glory and honour. He wants to cast off the stain of bastardy and prove himself a man of worth. It’s why he barely restrains the need to ride ahead of us for Winterfell. When this war comes, Aegon has his uncles, he has his knights, and whatever other armies you’ve been siphoning off for him. With Ned in the south, Jon has you and I, Martyn Cassel, Buckets and Howland Reed. No one else. Hardy as he is, Martyn is nearing seventy, Buckets is up in the mountains and neither of us has seen Howland Reed since we left Dorne. It falls to you and I to keep Jon safe against threats he cannot know of. He will not go to Greywater Watch while the North prepares itself for war. Not when it’s a chance for him to prove himself. The only thing that might save his life, would be a purpose…one only you could give him. Even a blind man would see how much he cares for you. If he had to stay behind to keep _you_ safe, grudgingly as he might, he would.”

“He could come with me to Dorne,” she suggested. “Robert would never get past the Boneway.”

“Ned entrusted him to me and to Howland.” 

Elia stared into her husband’s eyes, innards coiling into tight knots. “You ask me to choose between Aegon and Jon.”

“I ask you to protect a child you swear to love, only until we have a better idea of what we face. I promise you, Elia, if you truly want to leave, once Ned returns, I will take you to your son myself. I will even promise to break my sword and return to my castle if the north must stand against Aegon. I cannot fight against my lord but nor would I be the man to harm my wife’s child. I only ask that you help me protect this trust for now. You are the only person who can.”

As they walked back to camp, “Can you ever forgive me?” she asked him.

He did not look at her, only ahead. “I don’t know.” 

As they crossed Winterfell’s moat the next morning, saddle sore and just plain sore between the legs after her husband’s assault the previous night, her heart twisted and sunk with nerves when her gaze fell upon the red ringed eyes of Ned’s oldest son. Jon had already flown off his horse to embrace his brother.

“You are welcome to our hearth and home,” Robb said as she dismounted to stand beside Ethan. “I beg your pardons for not giving you a warmer welcome. We received news of my mother’s death last night.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter I wrote and the one I had in mind are so different lmao. For one, Elia spent more time in Winterfell in my outline. We saw the fallout from Cat’s death on the kids through her POV and it ended with news of Ned’s arrest arriving.
> 
> In the end I decided to do all that from Jon’s POV given the conflict between his own feelings about Cat and his love for his siblings. Jon has also been a quiet presence in this fic so far. So much of it has revolved around him but we’ve only heard from him once. I want to give him some page time. Plus, he’s the best person for us to get a look into how the Stark boys are coping as well. As present as Elia may have been at Winterfell, her own castle was still 300 miles away. Jon is their brother, they will open up to him in a way they wouldn’t anyone else. Plus, I’m sure Robb will appreciate the extra hands. Poor boy has a shitstorm heading his way. Though I’m not sure Jon will fare any better since his entire world is about to cave in. The next chapter (I may split it into two) will just be a bad few days in the office for our kids.  
> For now though, it appears our unplanned faves have come to a truce.. my head canon is Robett, captain of the Elia/Ethan ship, chewed his brother’s ear off when he rode ahead with him. It seems their truce is in place until Ethan speaks to Ned. About that...
> 
> Anyway, the dilly-dallying chapters are over and the war of the two kings (?) (Balon Greyjoy hasn’t said anything yet and Robb isn’t KiTN just yet) starts now. By now I mean hopefully in the next week though I cannot promise...


	34. Jon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHOOPS, I posted this chapter in Longing for Home - does that give you an idea of how tired I am lol?

**Jon**

The sun was just beginning to peak above the trees when they came upon the small clearing in the Wolfswood.. _Winterfell is only an hour away...less if I gallop._

He knew it’s pines, sentinels, weirwoods, oaks and streams like the back of his hand. He had hunted in these woods with his father, and Jory and his brother Robb countless times. It was during their last hunt together that they found the direwolves. Only six months before, it felt like a lifetime ago. Jon was still only the bastard of Winterfell then, Robb was unmarried, Bran was hale, Jory still had his arm, Father’s leg was unshattered, Heward and Wyl were still alive and Arya...they had not terrified the wolfblood out of Arya either. 

Jon remembered her as she was that day. She’d skipped her lessons with the septa. They found her riding and laughing freely, hair blowing in the wind behind her. _She made such a pleasant sight._ He only wished he would see her laugh like that again...he’d do anything for that. Especially now. Jory said she hadn’t been the same after her friend was killed, the boy Mycah, the one she’d been riding in the woods with that day. 

“We were fortunate it was me who found her,” Jory told him. “I cannot imagine what they’d have done to her had I not.” The Lannisters hunted her like a common criminal in the woods for four days. Jon wished he could have been there for her. _She must have been so scared, though she would not show it._ Jory helped her send her wolf away but he could not help her friend. That, he said, Arya had not forgiven any of them for. 

The only words Jon had had from her in all that time was a scribble at the back of Father’s only raven to him. _I practice my needlework everyday like I promised,_ she’d written in her slanted script. Jory told him Father had found her a Braavosi dancing master to teach her how to use her _Needle._ It was apparently the only joy she found in King’s Landing, the city that seemed to scathe Starks. 

Though he was worried sick for her, and for Father, Jon couldn’t help but feel a swell of pride in him that Arya had disarmed the weasel-faced prince. Were it not so morbid, he thought Robb too would find it funny to hear that their little sister had disarmed the boasting prince with a broom handle. 

The sun filled the sky with shades of orange and pink when the grey towers of Winterfell came to view. He tamped down the urge to gallop ahead once more. Behind Winterfell’s walls were his brothers. Behind Winterfell’s walls was news of Father. Behind those walls was home. Many things had changed in Jon’s life in the last six months but that was not one of them. 

In some respects, this urge to run home made him feel the boy he was and not the man he had become since he’d last hunted in these woods with his father and brothers. Six months ago he had felt an anchorless kite, aimless and drifting. Lady Stark had made it clear to him that she would not have him behind those walls any longer. For the month following, he thought his direwolf was more than just a companion but a symbol of himself. The day they found the wolves, they had collected all five pups and began riding off before Jon heard a noise. Ghost was all alone, apart from the others in the litter. He was different, and driven out because of it. Just the same as Lady Stark had hoped to do to him. But Ghost was a wolf. Wolves had packs and Jon had a father - one who gave him a gift Jon could never have imagined. All his life Jon had wanted to be a son worthy of Ned Stark. He had accepted early on he would never be Lord Stark’s heir. Winterfell would never be his. But he could be a son Ned Stark was proud to call his own. As he grew older however, that dream felt more distant every day. It first happened when Jon learnt that he was a Snow while Robb was a Stark, and grew more remote with every time Lady Stark doted on her children and ignored him, and everytime Robb sat beside their father in the audience chamber and not him, and every time he was made to sit with the squires instead of esteemed guests. 

So far-flung a hope it had seemed five months ago that Jon had seen himself as little more than a stain on Ned Stark’s honour, one that could only be washed out in the Night’s Watch, the only place no one would care what his last name was. But Father had given Jon what he had always wanted. Father made a public claim of his pride in him. Father set his bastard up to be a lord, gave him standing, and most significantly of all gave him a shield from Lady Stark’s cruelty. 

_How horrified she must be now,_ Jon thought. People called him Ned Stark’s _son_ now instead of _bastard_. From the White Knife to the northern mountains, everyone greeted him as the son of Ned. He was welcomed as the son of Winterfell who brought to an end the terror of Lord Bolton’s black-hearted bastard. Girls actually paid attention to him now too. He’d stolen a few kisses but never let it get any further, the fear that it would all be taken from him the moment he made a misstep loomed too heavily over him. He would marry one day - another thing he never imagined possible for him - but until he did he would not dishonour any ladies. Certainly not when their lord fathers welcomed him into their homes and their sons were keen on making his acquaintance. 

And though Lord Glover would never replace his father in his heart, Jon was grateful for the opportunity Father had given him when he sent him to join the Glovers until his return. Where Robb sat next to Father in the audience chambers, Lord Glover sat Jon at his right to watch and listen and learn from all he did.When he made a judgment he explained why he had ruled that way. He also continued the lessons Jon had learnt with Maester Luwin on history, strategy, and sums. And while Deepwood Motte had its own master-at-arms, Lord Glover had taken to seeing to Jon’s training in arms too. ‘ _Just as your uncle kept me sharp, so must I keep you,’_ he’d say. That was not all either. He had taken him on a progress through the Glover lands and beyond as well. Jon visited the northern clans with him, was welcomed in each hall and introduced to the men who would one day be his own vassals. 

Not to be outdone by her husband, Princess Elia had seen to his development as well. She’d have him sit with her whenever she looked through the ledgers and knew the considerable incomes of Deepwood Motte, the taxes owed to them and those they owed in great detail. She advised him on the different types of lumber favoured by each of the Free Cities and even spoke to him of ways he could make his own lands more productive while keeping his people and their livestock fed. He would need to do so if he wanted to attract people that far north. The Gift had laid bare for so many years because of its location. Elia Martell advised him on which crops to grow and when to do so, instructing him to shift away from the current practice of planting crops in one field while leaving the other to remain fallow to restore the ground. Instead, she counseled him to move to a four-field rotation where he’d leave one field fallow as was usual, grow turnips in winter in one to pull nourishment up in the soil, then ‘ _Given it’s always cold up here, you’ll need to plant hardy grains like rye or oats instead of wheat in the warmer months,”_ she told him. In the other fields he’d grow barley for ale and bread, and clover to feed the livestock. “And you will need to encourage that,” she continued. “Livestock will graze your fallow land of the weeds that would otherwise overgrow there. They will save your tenants time and nourish your land not to mention that the grazing land will keep them alive longer. That will allow you to use their milk and meat for longer. Keep your people fed and they will do the same for you.” 

Jon was surprised by how much she knew of farming and animal husbandry. When he asked how she knew these things she only laughed and said, “My mother was the Ruling Princess of Dorne she made sure we knew all there was to know of rule and trade. Then I married Rhaegar Targaryen.” She smiled conspiratorially. “If it was up to him I think he’d have spent his entire life in a library. He certainly turned his chambers into one. When we first married, King’s Landing was full of gossips and unsavoury company and Dragonstone was isolated so the books became my friends as well. Then I had Rhaenys and spent half a year abed. Rhaegar was planning his council at the same time.” Jon knew which council she meant, she often-spoke of how Rhaegar wanted to overthrow the tyranny of the Mad King. 

Sometimes Jon found it hard to reconcile the man Elia spoke of with the one who had snatched his aunt and raped her, but it wasn’t his place to speak of it to the man’s wife so he’d only listen quietly. 

“Whenever he came up to our rooms at night he’d share with me the plans he had. He needed to impress your grandfather, Lord Rickard, so he wanted to show him that he would not leave the north forgotten as so many kings before him had. _This,”_ she said, “was one of his ideas. Rhaegar never got the chance to share this idea with your grandfather but perhaps you could bring it into fruition.”

There were many other instances when she shared small wisdoms with him that made Jon pity the son she never got to raise. He once wondered if there was a mother shaped hole in Aegon’s heart. After all, both of them were raised by those who would love them - Aegon had his uncles and his guardians, and Jon had his Father and brothers and Arya - but neither of them had their mother. 

Jon dreamt of his mother at times, so often he could almost see her face. In his dreams, she was beautiful, and highborn, and her eyes were kind. He wondered if Aegon, as a small boy, had conjured up images of his own mother before that first visit to Winterfell when they were but boys. 

The truth was, however, that Aegon was nothing at all like Jon. Yes, neither of them had a mother growing up but Aegon _knew_ who his mother was, he had seen her, met her, hugged her even if only a handful of times. Eddard Stark wouldn’t speak a word of who Jon’s mother was no matter how often he asked. It was the one thing Jon had ever resented his father for. _Everyone should know who their mother is,_ Jon thought. He wouldn’t even know his own mother if he saw her. Aegon had no such trouble. They were not at all alike, he decided. Aegon was a prince for one and Jon was just a bastard. 

No one hunted Jon either. Just a word of who Aegon was had them setting off on this very journey. In some ways, it had helped him understand quite why Princess Elia had hidden news of her son. She had already lost a daughter as punishment for her first husband’s cause. Losing her only remaining child to it might just break her. Though that was not to say he did not understand quite why such news had angered Lord Glover. He had been married to Princess Elia for almost as long as Jon was alive. _How does one recover from such a lie?_ There was also the matter of what the prince did next. 

Jory said that the King’s Master of Whisperers was sure Aegon had no aim to take the Iron Throne but there was the matter with Princess Arianne. If the two of them were to be together as they wished, then the only way for them to do so would be for Aegon not to be hunted by the king. They would have no such issue if he became king. When Maester Luwin spoke of the rebellion, he said some houses, mainly those in The Reach, remained loyal to House Targaryen until the end. Some houses in The Riverlands did too, as did some in The Vale. Dorne had more reason than any of them to rise for the last of the Targaryens. That was the problem with claiming the crown by right of conquest, Jon mused. King Robert had overthrown a centuries old dynasty. What was to stop that from happening again? If it did, Father would stand behind his friend. Whatever Robert was now, Jon believed in the right of his cause. The Mad King had killed his grandfather and uncle, and called for his Father and King Robert’s heads. The Mad King’s son had raped Jon’s aunt too. Jon cared for Princess Elia and was saddened by what had happened to her and her children. He did not believe Aegon should be held accountable for his father’s sins but he also did not see a way Aegon could be king without a war...one Father would not sit out. When he thought of it that way, his heart went out to Lord Glover who would face a conflict no man should ever have to. Princess Arianne had spoken of giving up her claim for her love. It was the only bloodless resolution Jon could see. _They could be happy together in Essos, far from the king._

Winterfell's walls were closer now. Jon could see the inner walls jutting twenty feet over the outer ones. He could even make out movement in the guard turrets on the outer wall. His brothers were behind those walls and if he was lucky, Lady Stark was not. He hoped she had not returned from wherever she was just yet. He wanted some time with his brothers. He wanted some time to be home before she made him feel unwelcome with icy stares, a cold mouth and clipped words. 

Although, if war was coming - and Lord Glover talked about the possibility in hushed tones - he would have to face greater threats than Catelyn Stark. Lord Tywin Lannister, he’d heard, would not take the seizing of his son lying down and Jon knew from his own lessons that the north was too remote and unconquerable for a southron army. Father knew it too which is why they were manning the ancient stronghold. But the Riverlands lay in Tywin Lannister’s way... _the lands of Lady Stark’s father_ . Father would not allow an assault on those lands to remain unanswered and Jon would not sit back. If he could not be his father’s son in name, he would be his son in deed and stand beside him. Jon was to be his bannerman now and he would answer the call. _People may follow a bastard if he was named lord but no one would follow a coward. And coward I am not._ He would prove himself in war just as he had with the Ramsay business. ‘ _All dwarfs may be bastards_ ,’ Tyrion Lannister told him all those months ago, _‘yet not all bastards need be dwarfs.’_ Jon would not be one. 

Thought of the Lannister Imp brought a sour taste to his mouth. Jon had been fooled by him...he thought him to be different to his brother and sister who looked down their noses at everyone. Tyrion Lannister laughed and japed with people and he’d taken the time to talk to Jon during their month in the castle. _And he tried to kill my brother._ Jon would not forgive that. 

The gates were not closed, so all Jon had to do was ride beneath the outer gate, over the moat, and in through the inner gate. He had started so well, lordly even, but by the time he’d crossed the wide moat he’d not so much dismounted as swooped off his horse and was running to his brother. He was not much unlike his own wolf who’d darted ahead and was already tumbling with Robb’s wolf, Greywind. Robb was there in the courtyard of the Inner Castle. Beside him was Martyn Cassel, the castellan in Father’s absence, Theon Greyjoy, Maester Luwin in his grey cloak, Hal Mollen in the grey cloak of the Stark guard, and Wylla Manderly... _no she’s a Stark now, I must remember._ Bran was absent however, as was Rickon. 

Jon embraced Robb without a word and thumped his back heartily. Robb held him tightly but did not thump Jon’s back as he normally did whenever they reunited after a trip with father. When they looked at each other, Jon thought his own smile could have lit the darkest parts of Winterfell’s crypts. His brother’s smile was only an almost imperceptible twitch of his lips. Ice seemed to settle in Jon’s veins. His brother had been crying. 

“Father…” he trailed off. 

Robb shook his head and moved to greet the guests. Jon cocked his head at Theon in a gesture that could only mean, _what’s happened._ The permanent smirk Theon’s face housed was absent today. 

“You are welcome to our hearth and home,” Robb said in a voice that was not his own. “I beg your pardons for not giving you a warmer welcome. We received news of my mother’s death last night.” 

The tension that gripped his body when he thought something had happened to his father or his missing brothers melted immediately and was swiftly followed by a guilt that weighed heavily in his gut. He had just wished the woman was not home. She was not. She was dead and his brothers and sisters no longer had a mother. 

“How?” he managed to croak out.

Robb then related the tale that developed over three ravens. His mother had seized the Imp, and taken him to The Eyrie where her own sister was the lady, but she had been injured in the process, stabbed in the gut. Ser Rodrik too had been badly injured too. The second raven said that she had taken a turn for the worse and had Ser Rodrik write to tell Robb to send men to Moat Cailin, something Father had already instructed. The third raven came with tidings of her death. Her wound had festered and she had succumbed...and the Imp was free having won his trial by combat. Ser Rodrik would be bringing her body home in the company of Ser Brynden Tully, the Blackfish, a man Jon had heard of only by name and deed. 

_He won’t like me,_ he knew immediately. Jon was the permanent reminder of how Ned Stark had dishonoured his niece. Guiltily, he thought Catelyn Stark would not have gone to her grave without a few words about him. She had told him that she would never let him threaten her son when Father made him a lord. ‘ _Robb is my brother,’_ Jon said. ‘ _And you are a bastard,’_ she replied. 

Princess Elia wrapped her arms against Robb in commiseration. The princess had been in their lives for as long as either of them could remember. The gesture did not seem at all inappropriate or strange. She was Elia, the woman who told them stories and listened to theirs when they were children. Lord Glover gave his condolences too and the men who had been travelling with them began to fill the courtyard. Grooms came to see to the horses. Wylis, the gentle giant, took Jon’s and Wylla, acting Lady of Winterfell now, invited them into the Hall for refreshment. Jon didn’t miss the squeeze she gave Robb or the appreciation of the small gesture in his brother’s face. 

Jon looked around trying to spot his brothers. 

The princess asked Robb what suspicions Lady Stark had of the Lannisters. “Why would they harm Bran?” 

Robb didn’t know. 

“What does Bran say?” Jon asked.

“Bran is…” Robb started and stopped. “It’s best you see,” he finished. He asked Hal and Theon to see Lord Glover and Princess Elia to the rooms assigned to them. 

Tendrils crawled up Jon’s arms. “Bran is what?” He was not sure he could handle the answer. 

Robb only led the way...in silence.

“Robb...I’m so sorry,” Jon agonised when they were alone all while wondering what was worse - to know one’s mother and lose her or to never know her at all. Jon would say the latter was worse but he suspected his brother would think opposite. 

“Thank you,” his brother said, seizing his arm. They were the only people in this part of the corridor. Robb looked around and pulled Jon in for an embrace. Then he cried. 

“I don’t know what to do,” he sobbed quietly. “It was one thing to wait for Mother to return home after what happened to Bran but now she’s…” He struggled for what to say next. “Now she’s _gone_ ,” he finally said. “Father is whole kingdoms away, alive but injured and surrounded by enemies. Rickon has locked himself in his room and won’t speak to me at all. Farlen has chained up his wolf in the kennels after he bit Gage in the arm and tore a chunk of flesh from Mikken’s thigh. His wolf is wild and Rickon….he’s so angry Jon. He doesn't understand why Father and Mother are gone, why you left or why the girls aren’t here and, not that any of us could take such news well, but he hasn’t stopped crying since last night. I don’t know what to do.” Robb looked away, face red. 

“I’m here now,” Jon reminded him. 

“Aye,” he smiled tremulously. “You are.”

“I will do what I can to help.” 

They climbed the steps slowly. Suddenly, Jon recalled the last time he’d taken this route. Then as now, he was going to see Bran. When he last made his way up these steps, he’d avoided stopping by for as long as he could for Catelyn Stark had seldom left Bran’s side until he could wait no longer on the day he left Winterfell. She had threatened to call the guards on him and begrudged him even a final goodbye. Jon dared her to call the guards, surprised by his own obstinacy. It was the last time Jon had seen her and the first time she had ever called him by his name. ‘ _It should have been you.’_ she glowered. The woman hated him for being born...something he had never had a say in. 

Shadd stood guard outside Bran’s room. 

“We never leave him alone,” Robb explained. “He screams in his sleep scrambling at the air as if he’s falling.”

“He did fall.” 

“When he wakes he doesn’t say anything. He only cries, asks for his wolf and hardly speaks...the most he spoke was last night and that was only to sob that mother is dead because of him. It took Wylla ages to calm him.” 

Jon heard her voice before he saw her. “And the Others smelled the hot blood in him,” Old Nan shared in a chilling voice “...and came silent on his trail, stalking him with packs of pale white spiders big as hounds—”

“Jon!” Bran exclaimed dashing from the seat beside the window hurtling into his arms. Jon held him close, lifting him up. He was shrunken, and weighed as much as a leaf. It was clear that while he retained the use of his legs, he had not fully recovered. Jon kissed his head, tightening the hold he had on his brother. His wolf glanced up at him from where Bran sat with eyes the colour of smouldering gold. When he finally put him down, Jon expressed his commiseration which made Bran twitch. Just like that the warmth in his brother’s face was gone and Bran looked back at him with a cold, dead look. Jon turned his head to Robb in question and Robb’s words began to make sense. _“Bran is…”_ different. 

Jon asked him if he wanted to go for a ride, something Bran had once loved. Bran only shook his head and went back to his seat by the window. “I’m tired,” he said when he sat back down. “Perhaps another time.” 

“That’s the first time I’ve seen him smile in days,” Robb informed him. “Sometimes I wonder if I will see him laugh again.” 

“Why does he think your mother died because of him?” 

Robb shrugged. “Mother seized the man who would have killed him. I suppose he blames himself.”  
“There was nothing he could have done.”  
“ _We_ know that.” 

Jon made a stop by his old room before he went to Rickon’s and was chuffed to find his old chest untouched.

“We kept it empty,” Robb said about the room. “I hoped you’d return.” 

Jon fished around the chest until his fingers felt the wooden figures. When he pulled them out Robb smiled too. When he was little, Princess Elia had gifted them to him. The Young Dragon, Jon’s childhood hero, and his cousin, Ser Aemon the Dragonknight, the greatest knight to ever exist….although Bran would have something to say about that. 

Mikken was there before them, sawing through the door their brother had locked himself in. He’d just managed to cut through a large enough hole when a glass lamp came flying. It crashed loudly at Mikken’s feet. 

“Rickon, brother…it’s me,” Jon called out. “You don’t have to be scared, please let me in.” 

“Jon?” the voice on the other voice asked sceptically. 

“Hello, Rickon. It’s me.” 

Silence followed. Jon looked through the hole and was met with questioning blue eyes. “Jon!” he shouted before he moved to unbolt the door. 

“Robb took away Shaggy from me and mother won’t come back and you weren’t here-” So began Rickon’s complaints. He spoke and cried and held on to Jon until he fell asleep. Somewhere along the way he’d forgiven Robb too once he promised to release Shaggy so long as Rickon made him behave. They came to a tentative truce. Shaggy would be chained again if he hurt anyone else. Jon left Rickon asleep and clutching the two figurines across his chest. Mikken returned as they were leaving to remove the door from its hinges.

They retired to Father’s solar afterward. Jon was somewhat grateful to not have Theon Greyjoy intrude on their reunion. He always felt left out whenever he was there. Even as a ward, Theon belonged more with Robb than he did. Both had a House and names, though when he was given his lands, Jon too may one day have one, just as Benedict Rivers had when he created House Justman. 

Robb it seemed, was glad to have someone to talk to without being, what he called, Robb the Lord. They spoke late into the night about the fears of what came next.

“Theon urged me to call the banners,” Robb said. 

“Father is lord. Only he can call the banners.” 

“That’s what I said but he kept saying that if anything happened to Father I would have to fight. Thankfully, Father wrote to us himself to say he was alright but with news of the Kingslayer raising an army with his father… between you and I,” Robb confessed, “I’m grateful Lord Glover is here... I know, he’s supposed to be Father’s bannerman and one day may be mine but it feels good to have someone father loved and trusted here...someone who might know what to do.”

They also wondered why Father had chosen to hide Princess Elia in the north. Robb agreed Father was right to save her but thought it might have been more prudent to send Princess Elia to Dorne or to Essos where her son grew up before concluding that Father must have his reasons for this course of action. 

“How long are you staying anyway?” Robb asked later that night. 

“I don’t think Lord Glover will stay more than two days.” 

“And will you be joining him?” 

“No.” Jon would have to share that decision with the Lord of Deepwood Motte. His brothers needed him. 

He broke his fast the next morning in the only guest chambers within the Stark apartments with Princess Elia. Lord Glover was there too. They’d clearly come to some sort of understanding, Lord Glover had hardly exchanged any words with her since Jory came to Deepwood Motte...not until the night before they came to Winterfell. 

The rest of their men were either staying in the Guest House or out in Winter Town. 

“How are the boys doing?” Lord Glover asked. 

Jon sat and blew at the porridge the princess gave him. 

“They lost their mother,” Elia replied. “I lost mine as a grown woman and I cannot say it hurts any less, however old you are.” 

“It’s better than not knowing who your mother is.” Jon couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice but nor could he stop himself. “I don’t even know if my mother was a tavern wench, a camp follower or-”

“Your father is not one to lie with whores.” 

Princess Elia extended her hand out to hold Jon’s. “I’ve known Lord Stark for a long time,” she said. “And Ethan’s known him longer, believe him when he says that.”

Whatever Jon was going to say next was interrupted by a clammer coming from Father’s solar down the Hall. 

“And she says nothing of Arya!” Robb was shouting. “Nothing!”

Jon’s legs sprang up and sprinted of their own accord.

“Not so much as a word,” Robb repeated. “Damn her! What’s wrong with the girl?”

Jon tripped over an overturned chalice as he entered the solar. Greywind was snarling and Jory had a hand on Robb’s shoulder. Burning rage seemed to hiss from his brother. He was breathing deeply, noisily. 

“What happened to Arya?” 

Maester Luwin was standing out of Robb’s way. Theon burst in just after Jon. 

“What in the seven hells is going on here?” Theon asked. 

Lord Glover and Princess Elia filed in after him with Martyn Cassel. 

“What happened to Arya?” Jon demanded once more. Robb looked at him, clenched his jaw and handed Jon a scroll he picked up from the floor. 

_Father’s seal._ Jon began to read and felt his legs turn to water. He grabbed Theon’s shoulder and stared at the words. _Sansa’s script._ His heart beat so frantically he thought it would explode; his vision blurred. _Father...Arya..._ For a moment he was certain he would faint. Theon was holding him up he realised.

She didn’t want to go, he remembered. 

Theon took the scroll out of his hands and read it out aloud. King Robert was dead. Sansa said Father had conspired to commit treason with Lord Stannis Baratheon, Robb and Lady Stark were summoned to the Red Keep to swear fealty to Joffrey. Sansa promised to plead with Joffrey to save Father’s life once she married him. 

“Arya…” Jon rasped once breath returned to him. “Father was the only reason they didn’t hurt her at The Trident,” he said. They all heard the story from Jory. “If they would throw Father in the dungeons…” Jon lost his footing and Theon grabbed him. On unsteady feet he walked to a chair. 

If he looked anything at all like Robb, his face was ashen. 

“Damn the girl,” Robb muttered. 

“Those are Cersei’s words,” Princess Elia said in defence of Sansa. “They would not let her send a raven without crafting the words. Don’t blame her. I’m sure Arya is fine.” 

“The Mad King summoned your grandfather south and killed him,” Lord Glover joined in. “Your father is in the cells now just as your uncle once was.”

“You _have_ to call the banners now.” Theon turned to Robb. 

“He is right,” Lord Glover agreed. “This is no longer about protecting the north but returning your father home.” 

“My lord would not betray the king.” Jory’s voice was hushed. “There is something else to this.” 

“Ned must have learnt the truth.” 

“What truth?” 

“Cersei’s children are not Robert’s.” 

Everyone turned their heads to Princess Elia. 

“Ned would not turn to Stannis unless he found out,” she explained. 

“Elia what are you talking about?” her husband asked. 

“Who is the father?”

“Ser Jaime.” 

““Do you hear yourself, Elia?” Lord Glover barked. 

“You’ve seen those children,” She cocked an eyebrow at her husband. “Do any of them look like Robert?” 

“Your own son looks nothing like you.” 

“You clearly haven’t looked closely enough,” she snapped back. 

“The man is her brother!” 

“So?” 

“Why did you not say anything?” 

“Accuse the queen of adultery without proof?” She raised the scroll in her hand. “This is what happens to those who do.” 

“Elia. Enough.” Lord Glover censured, seizing her by the arm. “No one will believe that.” 

“The princess is not lying.” They all turned to the door. The racket managed to rouse Bran from his room. 

“Bran.” Robb marched over to their brother and Jon followed him. They crouched in front of him. “What do you mean?” 

“I saw them...in the tower...the queen and Ser Jaime. I was climbing when I came across them…doing...it. Ser Jaime grabbed me when he saw me and threw me. I landed in the hay, I was about to tell Arya and then I don’t remember. When I woke up everyone was gone. It’s all my fault,” he cried. “I should have died. If I did, Mother would be alive and Father would be alright.” 

“Bran,” Robb’s voice cracked. “Why did you not say anything?” 

“You said they were going to kill me. I thought if I didn’t say anything they might leave me alone but now Mother is dead...and now they’re going to kill Father.” 

“They won’t,” Princess Elia said. “I promise you, they won’t.” 

Lord Glover spoke then. “You are Lord of Winterfell now, Robb,” he declared. “The north is yours until your father’s return. Call the banners but this news should not leave this room. The Lannisters will expect you to come with the strength of the north at your back but they must believe your father is your only concern. Cersei has to believe she can win over your father.“

“My father will not side with her. Lord Stannis is the rightful heir.”

“The queen would not just hand him over,” Jory interjected. “Especially not now her brother is free.”

“We won’t ask her. She doesn’t have to let him go,” Princess Elia replied. “She just needs to hold him until we can get to him.”

They continued speaking but Jon heard nothing more. He held Bran against his chest. His brother shook in his hold, silent sobs wracking through him. _The punishment for treason is death._ .. _Unless the king forgives him._ Somehow Jon did not think the pinch-faced prince would grant such forgiveness, not when one word from Father could bring him down. 

And Arya...he knew her, she would not let anything happen to Father and stand aside. She was only a small thing. Men who could subdue Father could do much worse to her. If anything happened to her, it would be his fault. Arya wouldn’t have agreed to go south if he didn’t insist on the Night’s Watch. By the time Bran was injured and Father shared his plans with Jon it was too late for her to stay. _She didn’t want to go even then._

‘ _We...we might not see each other again for a long time,’_ she whispered when he woke up to her in his room that last night. Jon kept dismissing her worries instead of holding her as closely as she held him - as he should have. 

_‘I just want to stay here,’ she told him. ‘I want you to stay here with Bran and Robb and Rickon and I. I don’t want any of us to leave.’_ Jon wanted that more than anything now. He wished they’d never left, all of them. He wished they all stayed, even Lady Stark. Jon realised he was crying. 

The coming days were spent planning for a war made more urgent by the call for help from Ser Edmure Tully of Riverrun. The Lannisters had set their eyes on the Riverlands and fighting had already begun. Robb was honour-bound to answer the call. Ravens flew in and out. Lord Glover remained in Winterfell but sent his men to Moat Cailin as Father ordered with his brother. Princess Elia stayed too, saying she had no need to hide. If the north must fight Tywin then she would not sit such a thing out, nor would her brothers, she declared. _And her son,_ Jon added. The north was in uproar. Every house promised men. Those north of Winterfell promised to descend upon the castle for the march south and those in the south, the barrow knights and crannogmen, Lords Manderly and Flint, declared they would join them on the Kingsroad. 

Jon spent all his time with his brothers. He slept with Bran and Rickon every night. Robb joined them whenever he could but he had a wife to see to now. Bran still woke up in a cold sweat but said he felt better now he shared. Jon wasn’t quite sure of the truth of that. His brother still seemed a sack of skin and bones. 

Theon came to him one morning, saying Robb needed to see him. When exactly Theon became Robb’s page Jon could not say but answered the summons anyway. Three scrolls lay on the desk in front of Robb. Two were open and Robb was reading the third. His face was puzzled. 

“Is it news of Father?”

Robb silently pushed the scrolls across the desk to him the minute he noticed Jon. 

Jon picked up the first one. The seal, though broken, bore the mark of the three-headed dragon. There was only one Targaryen left alive. Jon shot Robb a puzzled look first and then looked at Maester Luwin. The old maester tugged at the chain around his neck. A sure sign of his discomfort. 

The message ran across the three scrolls. 

“Dear Robb,” the first read, “ _I regret that my first correspondence with you as Aegon Targaryen comes to you by raven. I write both to send you my condolences for your loss and my commiseration at the losses of House Stark in King’s Landing. Lords Renly and Stannis Baratheon are dead. Renly at the orders of Cersei Lannister and Stannis of natural causes before I took back my ancestral home.”_

Jon picked up the second in silence. _“I understand, of course, the scepticism you may have about my word in this matter, given the claim I wish to make for my birthright. That is why I am sending Princess Arianne Martell north to you in the company of Lady Shireen Baratheon who will tell you of her father’s demise herself.”_

The third was most bewildering. _“For now, I write to say that I owe Lord Stark an unpayable debt for all he has done for my mother. Whatever you do next, know that I will stand beside you. While I cannot undo the wrongs of the past, you and I are tied by the blood of one we love. My mother or Arianne, whoever arrives first, will tell you the meaning of those words. For now, know this, Houses Martell and Targaryen will stand with you for Lord Stark._

_Faithfully, Prince Aegon Targaryen of Dragonstone.”_

Jon drew his brows together in confusion and looked back at his brother. What blood tie could they have with Aegon Targaryen?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the books, Jon spends the first half of AGOT resentful that Ned let him join the NW knowing what it truly was. Here Ned had given him a different future so I think Jon would have been over the moon, hence the focus on how much he is thankful to his father. It also makes his upcoming identity crisis even more existential.  
> Then the raven from Sansa arrives with no mention of Arya, the one person he’d quite literally die for. If Ethan stood little chance of sending him to Greywater Watch before that raven, he stood none now. So I’m glad the plan was changed to send men to man Moat Cailin now while they waited for the north to descend on Winterfell. Ned, not Egg, is their biggest concern now. With Robert dead, they also don’t have the same urgency to hide Elia and the fear of Tywin is somewhat lessened because they’ll be going to war with him anyway. 
> 
> As for Bran, in the books he starts to recall that there’s something about the Lannisters he should remember as early as AGOT and when Cley Cerwyn mentions Jaime Lannister in ACOK, he nearly has a panic attack. So we know he was beginning to recall what happened to him- I can’t remember if he did. In this world, Bran is 12, not 7, and I’d like to think Robb may be more forthcoming about things that are happening at home which jogs his memory earlier and unfortunately scares himinto silence.
> 
> One of my fave scenes in the books is Robb and Bran holding hands in the dark and crying as they talk about visiting Jon and their mother coming home. Robb is just such a wonderful soul and I really wanted him to have support. The poor boy is carrying so much on his shoulders. I think it makes a world of a difference to have Jon there, and in the next chapter, Ethan Glover whose loyalty is to Ned, and Ned first lol. That will prove to be important because, as if they didn’t have a billion things to deal with, Egg has thrown a spanner in the works. I love how he’s all, I know how it looks but I didn’t actually kill Stannis (that was my uncle and his shady contacts). 


	35. Arya

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, you were expecting a continuation of the last chapter. So was I but a lovely reader requested a Robb POV for the fallout of Aegon’s letter. I think that’s a great idea and I want to give that time to develop. If I was going to post this week, the only true opportunity I had to write was during a flight and I had to write on my phone so I chose a chapter I could manage with these constraints lol. I apologise for how short it is.

**Arya**

Arya stopped and drew in a deep breath. Some creature–a cat or rat–scurried past her feet and disappeared into the dark. Her stomach made a hollow rumbly noise. It seemed to do that a lot lately. All she had to offer it was pigeon. King’s Landing - and Flea Bottom in particular, the only place Arya could truly remain lost in a sea of the forlorn - had nothing to truly forage. There were no berries or orchards filled with apples and cherries here, no rabbits and hares she could set snares for. There was nothing here for her to hunt either. Nothing but pigeons, cats, rats and the occasional crow. Of all her options, pigeons were the easiest to catch. Compared to cats most things were. Pigeon was also the only option she could fathom eating. She _liked_ cats and Maester Luwin spoke of how rats carried diseases. Crows flew faster than pigeons and were more like to fight her too. Occasionally, she had her pigeon grilled. For the cost of half a pigeon, the pot shops allowed her to have the other half grilled so long as she plucked the feathers off herself. On other occasions, she had her catches in a bowl of brown served with the occasional carrot, slices of what she thought was apple, clear films of questionable grease and other ingredients she tried not to think about. The only thing she could truly think of then was the stale bread they served it with and how that seemed to fill her belly. But often, she ate her pigeon raw and made herself sick. It was preferable to taking herself down to the pot shops...the scarcely empty pot shops full of people who eyed her boots and cloak, the only two things of value she had left apart from Needle and worse, men whose eyes crawled under her leathers. Some had even followed her out of the pot shops and into alleys, chasing her and calling her names that would make her mother and Septa Mordane turn crimson. _Sansa would probably faint if she heard those words_ , Arya thought but all she could do was run in fear for herself like a mouse and not at all like the water dancer Syrio had wanted to make her before he died. For her. Protecting her, the mouse who ran instead of fighting like the wolf she was supposed to be. _The lone wolf dies, her_ father told her, _and the pack survives._ Syrio was her pack and she left him to die. She should have tried to stand with him. _He told me to leave,_ she’d remind herself to steel her. It didn’t lessen the guilt though. 

Her pursuers never caught her, she was too quick for them. Well, for all but the one who caught her that first week when Arya didn’t know her way around the city. King’s Landing to her then was just a jumble of lanes and alleys and roaming streets that did not bear identifying marks or signs of their own other than  _ where _ they were respective to the three great hills named after Aegon and his sisters that loomed over everything. 

Arya had caught her first pigeon that day and a baker’s boy, the only person to talk to her of his own accord, told her he’d take her to a pot shop for a bowl of brown if she gave him a pigeon. She had two tied to her belt so she gave him one. He told her his name was Hot Pie and since  _ he  _ thought he could get away with calling himself as ridiculous a false name as that, she introduced herself as Nan. 

Old Nan spun fantastical tales and Arya decided she’d need to do the same to survive now. When she was not so scared and so terrified, Arya thought of herself as a character in one of Old Nan’s stories. She was a lost lady on the run from an evil queen - one who knew the name of the ship her father had hired and sent out men in grey cloaks trimmed with white satin to stand beside it. 

Arya’s heart had nearly leapt out of her chest when she saw those cloaks beside the Wind Witch, the ship that was supposed to take her home. Home was her mother and brothers, Old Nan and Hodor, Martyn Cassel, Ser Rodrik and Jory, Gage in the kitchens and Farlen in the kennels. Home meant the north and Jon. If she returned, Jon would come back. She knew he would and then she wouldn’t feel so alone. After so many days of fearing for her life she yearned for nothing more than the safety she felt in his arms that last night in Winterfell. 

Then, they would all come back for her father and Sansa. She realised with that thought that she was crying. 

Her dreams turned to smoke when she got closer to see the faces of the dicing men beside the ship.  _ Look with your eyes, _ she heard Syrio whisper. Arya looked. She knew all of her father’s men. The three in the grey cloaks were strangers. The queen had sent them there to ensnare her. Cersei had already shut the city gates and posted gold cloaks at each one of the eight gates to the city. The City Watch didn’t let anyone out until they looked them over and Arya wondered whether they knew what she looked like so she gave up going there. She’d seen men of the City Watch cut down a boy just a little older than Rickon. They wouldn’t have mercy on her if she fought back and the queen’s welcome would be no welcome at all. Not after what Arya had done to Joffrey at the Ruby Ford where Prince Rhaegar...Jon’s real father, had died. 

Arya turned her back to the false guards and dejected as she was, she comforted herself with the knowledge that in the stories the heroes always found adventure, good trumped evil and the heroes always made it home. But when she laid on cold hard stone at night or flea-ridden hay in a stable with hunger gnawing at her, belly snarling, eyes heavy, head starvation drunk, she would tell herself Old Nan’s stories were just that - stories. 

If good trumped evil, Jory would still have his arm, Wyl and Heward would be alive and it would be the Kingslayer who was dead. Hullen, who never carried a sword, would be alive and  _ she  _ would be dead. Hullen used his last breaths to call out to her. “ _ Arya Underfoot,” _ he whispered the day she escaped the Red Keep. _ “You must … warn your … your lord father …”  _ he said before frothy red spittle bubbled from his mouth and he closed his eyes for good. Arya was no hero. She was a murderer.  _ Father killed murderers.  _ She had killed that stable boy, skewered him right in the belly. When she tried to sleep at night she saw his face.  _ “Oh, gods,” _ he moaned, as his undertunic began to redden. _ “Take it out.”  _ When she took it out, he died. She killed him.

If good trumped evil, her grandfather and uncle would still be alive, Jon would have been raised a prince, loved and not lonely. Aegon might have been king and not on the run like her, Meryn Trant wouldn’t have killed Syrio, Mycah would be alive and it would be Sandor Clegane who was dead. 

If good trumped evil, her father would be back in Winterfell ruling his lands and not, as some said, in the black cells or worse, dead. She tried not to think of that. She’d know if her father was dead. She would have to. He was her father; he could not die and leave her alone in this city. It’s not like Sansa could help her. The Lannisters had her already. Arya hadn’t heard any word of her sister and no news seemed good news these days. The word on the streets was that her father had murdered King Robert. Others said the king was slain by his brother Lord Renly.  _ Why else would he flee in the night like a common thief,  _ she heard men ask over ale. A begging brother said Lord Renly  _ and  _ her father had been struck down by the gods for their treason. Arya had wanted to club him over the head but feared being struck down herself for that. She heard two gold cloaks say that the queen had ordered Lord Renly dead while two others said he was killed by outlaws. As varied as each story was, they all agreed on one thing. King Robert was dead. The bells in the seven towers of the Great Sept of Baelor had tolled for a day and a night, the thunder of their grief rolling across the city in a bronze tide. They only rang the bells like that for the death of a king, Hot Pie had told her. How he knew she couldn’t say. He was even younger than Robb and Jon and  _ they  _ were babies when the last king died. 

The boy Hot Pie had looked at her cloak and boots as well and asked her where she got such good boots. Arya told him to mind his business.  _ She  _ didn’t ask him why he called himself Hot Pie. That didn’t stop him from telling her the tale however. His mother had been a baker who sold pies. When he was a boy, her son used to push a cart filled with them around the streets calling out  _ hot pies, hot pies.  _ Telling her his own stories had distracted him from her. They sold her pigeon and she had been rewarded with a bowl of brown. Hot Pie left her the moment she got her food and while Arya had been glad for his company she was gladder still for the stale bread and hot soup. She sat alone, ignorant of the eyes that fell upon her. After a while, goose prickles stood on the back of her neck as if someone was watching her. Someone was. A droopy eyed man, strongly built with a pox-ridden face. 

“‘Ello lovely,” he said with a drawl unfamiliar to her when she left the pot shop. “Are you lost?” he leered. 

Arya shook her head and tried to speed past him but he caught her, quick as a snake. Quicker than her. Then he forced himself upon her. Bile rose within her when his filthy breath assaulted her nose. She turned her face away from him but he pulled back from her, licked a furry tongue over his thumb and rubbed her lips with it before wagging his filthy tongue at her. Arya bit his bottom lip hard and pulled back until she drew blood. He howled and punched her in the nose. She didn’t feel the pain then. She was as skittish as one of Hullen’s easily spooked horses, the ones only she and Jon could calm. She scratched and fidgeted until he pulled away from her far enough for her to raise a knee to his balls. He keeled over, his howls growing louder and then she was off. But before she could catch her breath, he was on her again, pulling her back into the alley. Suddenly, at that moment, when she felt like she could faint from her fear and his stink, Aegon's words returned to her and she threw all her force into a kick to his knee until she heard the bone crack. She pictured Jon as he smiled at her and thought she heard Wylla’s laugh and Bran’s high pitched scream that day but she couldn’t let that distract her. If she succumbed to her yearning she would die. He was moving toward her.  _ Swift as a deer  _ she spun away until her back was to him. 

“You bitch,” he barked. “For this, I’ll fuck you bloody.” 

_ Fear cuts deeper than swords. Quiet as a shadow,  _ she reached behind her until she found the metal then,  _ fierce as a wolverine, she _ struck Needle out aiming for his prick.  _ He will never do this again,  _ she thought before she ran.  _ He can’t.  _

In her time hobbling from stable to street corner for cover it dawned on Arya that she might never fit in anywhere. Back home, Fat Tom used to call her Arya Underfoot because she always found herself where she shouldn’t. Now, she was truly underfoot, trampled over  and lost to the world...or at least to  _ her _ world and those who cared for her. She was lost to the queen as well but that was intentional...especially now she knew the queen was looking for her. 

Even so, Arya wondered if anyone here would truly call her Arya Underfoot.  _ Even if they knew my name.  _ For all Septa Mordane called her scarcely a lady and her father’s bannermen oft-mistook her, when she was younger, for a stable boy when she tied her hair back and stole Bran’s breeches, Arya Stark  _ was _ a lady, whether she acted one or not. It seemed as if everyone in Flea Bottom sensed the same.  _ How _ they sensed what was different about her she could not say. Her hair was matted, her face was muddied, and her clothes - she had only the ones on her back left - were as flea-ridden as anyone else’s in the district and  _ still  _ they remained either wary of her, dismissive or outright abusive. Whenever she tried to make a friend who might give her a place to sleep, the little ones of an age with Rickon looked at her with quick, wary eyes and ran away. Their older siblings of an age with her, Bran and Sansa called her names and threw sticks at her. Others, like Hot Pie, who she hadn’t seen since that first day, asked questions she couldn’t answer about the quality of her clothes, dirty as they were. Some even tried to steal from her. Sometimes they did. That first night out of the Red Keep, Arya found an abandoned, burnt-out house in Pig Alley. It was good enough to sleep in. So scared as she was, she hadn’t considered why no one had slept there in a city full of those who were truly underfoot. When she escaped the Red Keep Arya had snatched a silver baby bracelet from her overturned chest by the stables. She’d hoped to sell it and she knew she needed to stay warm so she grabbed a woolen cloak, a velvet skirt, a silk tunic, some smallclothes, a dress her mother had embroidered for her, rags for her moonblood and Needle. She had bundled all her clothes together and gone to sleep. When she awoke all her belongings were gone. All they left her was the cloak she had been huddled in, the leathers on her back, her wooden practice sword, the rags she’d tucked into her small clothes as she bled… and Needle. She’d been lying on top of Needle, or else it would have been gone too; it was worth more than all the rest together. Since then, Arya had taken to walking around with her cloak draped over her right arm, to conceal the blade at her hip. The wooden sword she carried in her left hand, out where everybody could see it, to scare off robbers. Sometimes she used to beat off those who would try and rob her too. Only a few days ago, a scrawny tavern wench twice her age had knocked her down and tried to pull the boots off her feet, but Arya gave her a crack on her ear with her stick sword that sent her off screaming and bleeding.

Arya had taken to keeping herself to herself. In the last three weeks she took to sleeping on rooftops and in stables, and anywhere she could find a place to lie down. While the small crawl spaces she slept in had given her some sense of safety, it hadn’t taken her long to learn that the district was well named. Her clothes and hair crawled with fleas. Thin and flat bodied the only way she could get rid herself of one was to squeeze it between her fingernails but it did little to help. Wherever there was one, others followed. Her  legs and ankles, waist, armpits, breasts, and the folds of her elbows and knees  were full of small, red bumps. She dreaded the time her moonblood would return upon her. She had only the two rags the thieves had left her with. She would wash one and wear the other and swap them round but with fleas for company the thought made her cry. 

For all they called her Arya Underfoot in Winterfell, for all the years she spent mucking around in mud with her brothers, she realised with a great itch that she was as much a lady as her sister. The flea bites made her cry and scratch her skin bloody while wishing for nothing more than the hot springs of Winterfell to cleanse her completely. 

But there were some things even Winterfell could not cleanse her of...some things even her family may not forgive her for. Arya was a murderer, and every subsequent day made her closer to becoming a thief. Her lord father had warned her against thievery but with each pang of hunger she found it harder to remember why. So much raw pigeon was beginning to make her sick. 

She climbed up the loose bricks at the back of the tiny forge. It was the only one she’d found outside the Street of Steel. Its rooftop had a small alcove that protected her from the rain. It was cleaner than the stables and safer than the street corners and alleys. She unclasped the pigeon from her hip and hung it off the top of the alcove, put Needle down, laid down and wrapped her cloak all around her. Spring in King’s Landing was as warm as a hot summer’s day in the north. She wrapped her cloak around her more for the feeling of being covered than true need for it. The cold hard floor made her wish for her featherbed and for Winterfell. More than anything though, she had wished for Jon. He was the only person who would want her whatever she did. Or so she told herself. He promised nothing would ever stop him from caring for her.

She knew he would listen to her when she explained that she was scared of the stable boy and that she hadn’t intended to kill him and he would hug her and hold her close when she told him of the man who tried to force himself on her. He’d stroke her hair and whisper words of safety to her until she felt truly safe. He wouldn’t even mind that her hair was so matted or that he couldn’t muss it, it couldn’t get any more mussed anyhow. She wondered if he and Robb had heard tell of what had happened here. Were they coming to free Father and Sansa...and her? Did anyone know she was still alive? Was anyone looking for her? Had Princess Elia told Jon the truth? She wished for Jon more than anyone and stifled a sob. Would he forgive her for what she had hid from him? Father had reason, Elia too but he had trusted Arya with everything and she held the truth of who he was. Once he learnt the truth...Arya cried until she drifted into the respite only sleep could offer the bone tired. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you’ll forgive me for the jar to the continuity of this story. I thought choosing an Arya POV for this intermission chapter made sense because her story doesn’t interact with any of the other POVs for now. I suppose placing it here takes some of the suspense out of subsequent chapters where everyone’s worried about her but we have entire books where Arya’s family worry about her all while we as readers know what became of her.  
> Another thing to note is that according to the ASOIAF timeline, Arya spends 2 months on the streets between Ned’s arrest and execution. First things first, that just breaks my heart for 9 year old castle-raised Arya and secondly, it makes me appreciate that little girl’s ability to survive in some of the most heartbreaking circumstances ever. I wanted to focus on the first three weeks in this chapter and after the next Robb & Jon POVs I’ll return to the rest of what was originally Arya’s chapter. I’ll do this once I’m back from leave (or if I get bored on my next seven hour transit in 2 days).  
> If Arya’s first few paragraphs seem disjointed and full of trains of thought that meander into tangents and then return to the original point she was thinking about, it’s intentional. The girl is terrified, traumatised and hungry.  
> She’s also older so while in the books she’s unsure what those unsavoury men are thinking, here she really does and it’s harder for her to hide herself.  
> For all the talk about Arya being nonchalant about death, that stable boy, the guard at Harrenhal, and the pimply squire all still haunt her in the books. I wanted to pay attention to the stable boy here. It breaks my heart when she meets Harwin an entire book and a bit later and tells him of all the things that happened to her but the murder because Harwin is her father’s man and she couldn’t imagine telling her father about this.  
> And lastly, is it an Arya chapter if she’s not wishing for Jon lol?


	36. Robb

**Robb**

For as long as he could remember Robb Stark felt a distinct responsibility to be a paragon for his family and a worthy forebear of the Stark name. He was to one day become the head of the family after all. He could not say  _ when  _ he began carrying that expectation but it felt as if it had always been there. He assumed it was there when Sansa was born when he was two. His mother told him of how he guarded her cot to make sure she never wanted for anything. He was old enough to remember telling her stories of knights and princes more times than he truly cared for just because he knew it made her happy. 

His responsibility as the oldest brother was certainly there when Arya, he heard, came wailing into the world when he was barely three. His father said Robb used to watch over her to make sure she didn’t get into too much trouble. Too much being the operative words for Arya’s talent in life was to find herself where she should not. And when she found herself in trouble, he took the blame for her misdeeds...at least on those occasions Jon hadn’t got there first. It earned them flowers, tarts, whatever else she could pilfer from the kitchens and a toothy grin each time.

The presence of his responsibility was memorable enough when Bran joined them when Robb was five. Robb remembered being on the other end holding his arms out to Bran as he took his first steps. He was far enough for it to be a challenge for the stumbling toddler with his chubby legs but close enough to catch him before he landed on the ground with a thump. By the time Rickon was born, when Robb was two-and-ten, he truly understood what it meant to be an older brother. It was to be a pillar of strength and a cushion against life’s troubles. 

What he had not understood, what he could not, was how to be an older brother, a mother, and what he feared most of all, a father, to his siblings. At the ripe old age of seven-and-ten, as a married man expected to have his own children, even as heir of Winterfell, nothing could have prepared him for the position in which he found himself. 

Certain things were to be expected from a first born son, grander things from the heir to Winterfell. To marry well was a certainty. He’d done well in that regard, taking the granddaughter of the richest man in the north to bride. 

As first born son and heir to Winterfell, he’d also be expected to act on his father’s behalf while his father was away. He’d been training for that all his life and had taken up the mantle intermittently from the age of four-and-ten whenever his father had to travel the land.  _ There must always be a Stark in Winterfell,  _ were words as ancient as the stone castle around him. He’d  _ been  _ that Stark. He’d expected to be that Stark so long that when he  _ became _ that Stark on a more prolonged basis when Father travelled south, the task did not seem so heavy. His mother was there beside him. She had of course her own troubles after Bran’s fall but her presence in the castle was all he required. All his life she’d been there with her warmth, love and above all advice. Her mere presence gave him strength. 

“I was my father’s heir for a long time,” she told him more than once.

“I was both a son and daughter to him,” she’d say right before she shared some wisdom or other with him. 

To think that he, and his siblings, would now be deprived not only of her presence for the rest of his life but possibly of their father’s as well was the most calamitous of situations anyone could find themselves in. Robb more than most. He was quite certain his parents were the best two parents any one could wish to have. Now he was expected to not only live with the absence of both of them, one more permanently than the other, but to try and step into his father’s shoes. The north was rallying and he would have to lead them. He was not prepared for that. Nor was he allowed to show such weakness. Not when his own father had been thrust into Robb’s position when he was hardly any older himself. Ned Stark was nine-and-ten when he lost his own father and the brother who would be lord to a mad king and his sister to the mad king’s son. Such a thing would break a man, Robb thought. But his father was no ordinary man. His father was Lord Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North. 

He was the sort of father any lordling would be honoured to call his own. His father was brave, courageous, renowned, a hero to Robb and above all, a father who loved him. He’d taught Robb to ride himself, he’d sparred with him much more than was usual for a lord, much less a Lord Paramount, and had always made time for him - his interests, his education, and, yes, even his troubles. He had done much to prepare him for the mantle he would one day have to take; one day, when Robb was past fifty, and greying himself. 

His father was loved by his people as well. Men arrived every day from distant keeps and small holdfasts, from the mountains and the valleys.

As loved as Ned Stark may be, as loved as any man in his position may be, what no first born son, at least not one with a father as great as Robb’s, ever wishes for is to take his father’s place for that would mean the death of his father. That was something no son could prepare themselves for. 

Robb was not even prepared, not truly, for this...this brink at the precipice he found himself at. His mother was dead and before he could truly grieve for her, news came that his father was accused of treason and thrown in the black cells, at risk of execution. His sisters were taken as hostages, though he only had news of one sister, while his brother had witnessed the queen’s treason and had nearly died for it not once but twice. As if that was not enough, his uncle had called for his aid in the Riverlands. Tywin Lannister and his kingslaying son had brought war to the lands of Robb’s grandfather. He was honour bound to answer that call. What he was not, was prepared. Some days he felt as if he might just collapse from the strain of it all and the worst part was neither his mother or father were here for him to turn to just as they might have whenever he stumbled previously. 

There was Wylla of course, but Robb presumed that most women, like his younger siblings, expected their husbands to be the definition of strong. Besides, she was even more inexperienced of the world he found himself thrust into than he himself and being not any older than him, had no wisdom to offer him truly. Well, none beyond the comfort he found in her arms at day’s end anyway. 

The night news of his mother’s death arrived, Robb had seen to Rickon and Bran’s comforts first - as much as he could. He was hardly coping himself, there was no way he could expect them to take the news any better. Bran withdrew into himself and Rickon, only now at five understanding that death meant no return after his own pony’s demise, exploded at the unfairness of it all. Calming that fire had taken, he thought, all his energies...until he retired to his rooms that night. 

The wolves’ howls were all anyone could hear in the castle. Older now and stronger, they were even louder than the howls that rang out while Bran was abed after his fall. Robb felt their rage and their loss distinctly. More than once, he felt as if he  _ was  _ a wolf - a sure sign that he was losing his mind at the one time he could not afford to do so. Struggling to fit his leg into his breeches that night, he hurled the thing with a howl so akin to Greywind’s he feared himself the scale of his anger. Wylla picked the offending article of clothing up and passed him a pair of breeches from the bed without a word. He realised then that he had been trying so strenuously to fit his leg into the arms of his shirt. The realisation winded him and with it came another howl, this time of devastation at his loss - the one loss he had never once truly contemplated. As nonsensical as it seemed, Robb had always imagined his mother would always be in his life. He had never known a reality without her. 

Wylla comforted him that night, quietly, with hardly a word. She just sat with him. 

“I cannot pretend to know how it feels,” she whispered, holding his face close to hers. “But know this, that I am here.” 

As comforting as her words felt, he could not allow himself to sully her own image of him. Everyone expected strength from him. He could not disappoint them. Including her. 

His mother was a strength to his father, he knew. The difference between his parents and he and his wife was that they had been married for eighteen years. Robb and Wylla had not been married for an eighteenth of that time. They hadn’t even been married for half of an eighteenth of that time. He could not appear weak in front of her more than just the once. Not when they were just getting to know one another as husband and wife. Early impressions counted for too much. He would not allow her to think him weak. 

He could turn to Old Martyn of course. He was the closest thing Robb had to a grandfather in his life but with his own son having lost an arm in defence of Robb’s father and his brother having come so close to death in defence of Robb’s mother, Robb felt it too onerous a task to burden the man with his own troubles.

Maester Luwin was an option, as were Hal Mollen and Jory, upon his return, but neither quite fit for what he needed. Theon Greyjoy had never been an option, not for true. With his bluster and his jokes, Theon was a man Robb turned to for fun. He was not the man he’d need at a time like this. 

The only person who might even come close to giving him the strength he needed was the one person he’d long since given up the need to pretend with. His brother Jon, his half brother truly, but his companion consistently. Until their separation after his wedding, Robb and Jon had scarcely spent any time away from one another. That feeling of responsibility present with all his siblings had never been there with Jon. 

Robb couldn’t remember the births of Sansa and Arya but he could distinctly remember them being younger than him, in need of him as they crawled and stumbled. He had no such memories of Jon. They were born not even a year apart and by the time Robb had arrived at Winterfell as a baby with his mother, Jon was there. He had been Robb’s best friend, his rival at times, and his constant companion always. Not that he could remember it, but he was sure they took their first steps together, said their first words at the same time and did everything together since. Were it not for the fact that Jon had a different mother, Robb would say Jon was as close to him as a twin may be. Best of all, Robb had never needed to pretend to be anything but who he was with Jon. And when he needed his brother most, Jon arrived. Robb could not imagine dealing with the events life had thrown at him without him. 

If an older brother was, as Robb thought, a pillar of strength and a cushion against life’s troubles then his younger half-brother had always worn that particular mantle with an ease that even Robb envied. Jon pretended he didn’t but Robb knew the truth. He’d known it since they were children and Jon started to let him win when they sparred when Robb knew he could have beaten him. He knew it when lords visited and Jon made himself scarce so Father’s bannermen got to know the trueborn son of Eddard Stark and not his bastard, and he knew it when Jon denied doing any of this just to comfort Robb. He also knew that his mother was the architect of all this even when Jon pretended she wasn’t. 

He wasn’t just that pillar for Robb either. Rickon preferred him to all of them because Jon indulged him where Robb tried to create the boundaries their parents could not in their absence. Bran seemed to open up with Jon’s return in a way that he hadn’t previously. Jon and Sansa hadn’t had a particularly warm relationship but whenever she needed him, Jon was there. And Arya...Robb envied the relationship Jon had with her. Robb was his best friend, he knew that. But with Arya...Jon had something else with Arya. The silent competition that sometimes marred his relationship with his half-brother was absent there. The two of them had been inseparable as children which made Arya inseparable from Robb since she’d always find a way to squeeze herself into whatever they did. Robb had tried more than once to exclude her as they did boys things but Arya always needled her way through. 

And now, he knew not where his sister was. That was the most frustrating part of events. His mother was gone. It tore him apart but he had some news of her. He worried day and night for Sansa who was in the hands of the Lannisters but he knew she was alive. He did more than worry for his father. He struggled against mourning for a man still alive. It was all because he couldn’t help but think of his uncle who had died in similar circumstances and his grandfather had done so too in his attempt to free him. Robb wondered more than once whether he too would perish in the south. But at least he had something to feel there. With Arya there was nothing but a gaping pit of anxiety. Why hadn’t Sansa mentioned her? Had they killed her? If so, how had they killed her? Was it a painful death? Where was her body? How does one cope with the death of his mother, father and sister?  _ How did Father cope and still stay standing?  _ Was she alive? How were his sisters? Were they being mistreated? Were they together or apart?

The questions never stopped coming and the only person who could understand him was Jon. He was the only person who could understand any of them. He let Rickon have Shaggydog again and made sure Ghost stayed with them always to restrain their black brother. He managed to talk Bran out of his room and had taken him for a ride. He had even taken to going through the ledgers with Maester Luwin while Robb met with the lords that came. It would take coin to feed an army as large as the one they would assemble so he helped Robb with that too. As did Princess Elia who seemed to excel even the maester when it came to sums. 

And when it all got too heavy for him, Jon was the only person Robb allowed himself to cry in front of. 

Robb had just finished breaking his fast alone when Maester Luwin came clunking into the room. The maester tugged at his chain. It was a gesture Robb had long ago learnt meant the maester was about to deliver bad news. Robb did not think he could deal with any more bad news. 

“Robb,” he said, shuffling forward. He had three scrolls in his hand, all sealed with red wax. “A raven has arrived from Dragonstone.” He lifted one scroll. “Sealed with the three-headed dragon of House Targaryen.” 

Robb rose. It could only be one person. Aegon. Aegon who they had met as children and again as adults just a few months ago. Aegon son of Rhaegar and Princess Elia. The boy they knew as Prince Oberyn’s bastard and the boy the king wanted the dead. The reason his father had sent Jory north.

“Isn’t Lord Stannis holding Dragonstone?” Robb asked, mostly to fill the silence as he broke the seal. If Aegon was sending them a letter then Lord Stannis was no longer in control there. 

Maester Luwin tugged on his chain again. Robb read the contents. 

Stannis was dead, apparently not at Aegon’s hand. The Targaryen prince sent his condolences and pledged his support and curiously, Robb found as he read the last scroll, he spoke of a blood tie between them and him. One his mother or Princess Arianne could explain. 

Robb stumped back into his chair. 

“What do you think this means?” he asked Maester Luwin, handing the scrolls to him. 

Maester Luwin read each in turn. Tugged at his chain some more and said, “Lord Stannis is dead as is Lord Renly. He is making a claim for the Iron Throne and he seeks your allegiance.” 

Robb knew that. He did not doubt that Aegon knew of the queen’s incest either. With lords Renly and Stannis dead, it made him next in line for the throne. Had the Lannisters not had his father and his sisters, Robb may just have bent the knee to make them pay for Bran and what they did to his father and sisters but he couldn’t act hastily. 

“Have Jon summoned,” he ordered. “I need Theon, Jory and Martyn Cassell here too...and Hal Mollen,” he added. He would speak to Lord Glover and Princess Elia later. 

He re-read the third scroll again. 

Jon arrived with Theon at his back. Both shot him questioning looks. Robb handed his half-brother the scrolls first. 

“What is this supposed to mean?” Jon asked. “What ties by blood?” 

The rest filed in. Only Martyn Cassel was missing. 

“My father rode out to Winter Town this morning,” Jory explained as he sat down. “I’ve sent word out for him.” 

Robb nodded and relayed the contents of Aegon’s letter. 

“What blood tie could we possibly have with the son of the man who raped my aunt?” Robb asked again, hoping his father’s men would have an answer. Two of them had fought with him in the rebellion. 

“What is of more importance,” Jory replied, “is how Prince Aegon came to hold Dragonstone. We only got news of him recently.”

“He killed it’s previous holder,” Theon shrugged. “Even if he does deny it.” 

“He’s sending us the man’s daughter,” Robb said. “Surely, if he’d done it, he would keep her close to him. Sending her here is to give away a valuable hostage. He doesn’t know whether we’d crown her.” 

“Are we?” Hal asked. “Crowning her? They have your father, Robb, and the girls-” 

“We are not but he doesn’t know that. Why would he let her go?” 

“Perhaps he has someone important to her.” 

“There is no word here,” Maester Luwin interjected, “of the girl’s mother, Lady Selyse Baratheon.” 

“Are you saying they would hold her against the girl?” 

“Wouldn’t put it past a Targaryen,” Hal said dismissively. “What they did to your grandfather-” 

“This is an invitation of friendship,” Jon said, speaking for the first time since the others joined them. “He speaks of what Father did for Princess Elia during the sack…”

“But what ties us by blood?” Robb found himself asking again. 

“There’s only one thing for it.” Theon pulled himself off from the wall he was leaning against. “Speak to the princess.” He shrugged, smirking. “She is here after all. I suppose she’ll be wanting to know her son has conquered a castle too.” 

Princess Elia arrived in the company of her husband. Both of them looked around the room confused. Lord Glover read the contents with his wife at his side. 

Princess Elia gasped, tears springing in her eyes, she grasped her chest. And then she sighed with a grateful smile.

Lord Glover blanched.

“Robb,” he said. 

At the same time, Princess Elia leaned up to read the last scroll and the smile disappeared. 

“A word if you please,” Lord Glover continued. He looked around the room. “Alone.” 

Robb nodded at the rest of the people in the room. 

“Not you, Jon,” Princess Elia said. 

“Jon, please,” Lord Glover asked, motioning to the door.

“No.” Princess Elia grabbed a hold of Jon’s arm. “Stay.” She shot her husband a look of defiance. 

Robb looked between the two of them as the room emptied. Lord Glover had a bulging vein on the side of his head and Princess Elia stood with clenched teeth and raised shoulders. She was tiny next to her husband but it didn’t stop her from staring him down. 

When the door shut leaving only the four of them in the room, Princess Elia’s hand still clutching Jon, Lord Glover grabbed his own wife’s arm.

“You knew of this.” 

“How,” in a tone dripping with such venom, “was I supposed to know?” she replied. “All ravens came to your desk first and since Jory came north, I haven’t known whether my child was alive or dead, hunted as he was by  _ your  _ king.” 

“Do you expect me to believe you had no knowledge that your son planned to take Dragonstone?” 

Robb got the feeling that they were now having a conversation he, nor his brother, was supposed to be privy to. And yet he could not find his voice.

“When the Greyjoys took Deepwood Motte, your ancestors took it back.” Princess Elia raised her index finger. “When the Red Kings burnt Winterfell, the Kings of Winter took it back.” She raised a second finger. “Dragonstone is Aegon’s,” Princess Elia said, raising a third finger. “He merely took back what is his.” 

“He killed Lord Stannis, the rightful king.” 

“If my son says he did not kill Stannis...he didn’t.” 

Lord Glover scoffed. “Are we to believe that your son just happened to come upon Dragonstone to find the rightful heir dead just after his own brother died.”

“I believe you’ve summarised things quite correctly.” 

Lord Glover narrowed his eyes. “What’s to say your son’s men did not kill Robert?” 

“If they did...” she leaned forward, “I would be the first to claim it.” 

Jon looked at Robb and Robb at him. They raised their brows at the exact same time. 

“My lord…” Robb finally interjected. “You asked to speak alone…” 

“Yes,” he replied, shooting his wife another look brimming with anger. “I did ask to speak to you alone.” 

Jon shuffled on his feet. “I should go,” he said.

“You will not.” Princess Elia tightened her hold on him. 

“Elia.” Lord Glover growled lowly. “You have no right!” 

She did not turn to him. “This concerns you,” she said to Jon. “And your mother.” 

Robb sprung up from his seat. Jon’s head whipped back to look at the princess. He was heaving now, chest moving, eyes wild. Talk of who Jon’s mother was, was a forbidden topic in Winterfell. Ever since they were children, Robb knew he had a mother and Jon did not. Or perhaps he did but neither of them knew whether she lived, let alone who she was or where she was from.

“You know my mother?” Jon rasped, voice hoarse with an emotion Robb could only identify as longing. 

Robb moved from his seat behind the desk and to where the three of them stood. 

“Elia,” Lord Glover said more weakly now.

“I didn’t know her very well,” Princess Elia said, ignoring him. She was crying Robb realised too late but she smiled so warmly at Jon. 

Jon tilted his head to look at her. Robb found himself doing the same with a most uncomfortable feeling in his gut.  _ Is she... _

“We should sit,” she said, releasing her grip on Jon’s arm only to take his hand in hers when they sat. She leaned forward then and smiled again. “I didn’t know her very well,” she said again.

Robb sighed with relief.  _ So she isn’t. _

“I only spoke to her once,” Princess Elia went on. “She loved you so much.” 

Jon’s face was red, and in his stormy eyes Robb saw a thousand feelings flit. 

“If she did why isn’t she here?” Jon whispered. 

Lord Glover closed his eyes and sat. He rubbed his face and then looked at Jon with regret in his eyes. Robb sat there silently observing them all, wondering the whole time, whether he should even be in the room. 

“She would, if she could, sweetling,” Princess Elia replied and Robb knew then, for a surety, finally, that like his own, Jon’s mother too was dead. He realised the moment this dawned on Jon too by an almost imperceptible twitch in his jaw. 

“The first time I ever had a chance to speak to her was on the day she died.” 

Jon clenched his jaw, trying so hard not to cry. He failed. 

“She loved you greatly,” Princess Elia said. “She hung on to life until Lord Stark made it to her side and she only departed when she entrusted you to the one man who could protect her child from the terror that started with Robert’s Rebellion.”

“Who-” 

“Your father and mother met at Harrenhal,” she interjected. 

Robb knew Harrenhal for many things. He knew that Harren Hoare raised the castle with its Hall of a Hundred Hearths. Though if his uncle Benjen was to be believed, it did not actually have a hundred hearths. “Perhaps a third of that,” he said. 

He knew that Aegon the Conqueror and his dragon Balerion the Black Dread had burnt Harren in his sons inside the Kingspyre Tower. He knew Harrenhal belonged to House Whent, his grandmother’s house. He also knew that Harrenhal was where Prince Rhaegar had crowned his aunt the Queen of Love and Beauty. Then he seized her and raped her. And now he knew, it was where his father had met Jon’s mother.  _ He had met her when his mother was still betrothed to Uncle Brandon… _

“Lord Whent had called a tourney to celebrate his daughter’s name day, or so went the story,” she said, turning to Robb. Jon it seemed already knew this part at least. He remained impassive. 

“The true reason of course, was not to celebrate the name day of Lord Whent’s daughter. Rhaegar had intended to call a council then to overthrow King Aerys.”

_ This was _ news to Robb. 

“So why did he fight for his father in the rebellion?” Robb found himself interrupting. “If he wanted to overthrow him…”

“Robert was not only rebelling against the Mad King,” she answered. “He wanted Rhaegar dead.” 

“Because he took his betrothed.” Aunt Lyanna’s bones lay in the crypts. Robb had been to her crypt with Father countless times. 

“He wanted all Targaryens dead. By that point, Robert would not have bent the knee to Rhaegar whatever happened...my Rhaenys paid the price for that.” 

That silenced Robb. Though his father seldom spoke of the war, and his mother knew little of it, Prince Oberyn had told them of what happened to Princess Elia’s daughter. A boy died that day, not the princess’ son he learnt later, but she had lost her daughter then too. His father saving the princess is what had made the Martells sworn friends of his father. It was why Aegon now, he presumed, had extended the hand of friendship to them. 

“What does this have to do with my mother?” asked Jon. 

“Right,” she said, turning back to Jon. “Your father told me how they met.” 

“Father doesn’t speak of her.” 

“Lord Stark loved your mother very much.” Princess Elia leaned forward and cupped Jon’s cheek. Smiling, she said. “Believe me, if he doesn’t speak of your mother, it is only because he loved her more than you could ever imagine.” 

Robb felt a burning feeling in his chest. Had his father loved Jon’s mother more than he loved Robb’s? It was a silly feeling to have he thought. Both their mothers were dead. It didn’t matter. Once again though, he wondered whether he should be in the room. 

A tear fell from Jon’s eye. He rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. “How did they meet?” he inquired. 

Princess Elia smiled at him again. “Your mother came across a group of squires taunting one of her father’s men,” she told Jon. “And she rushed to his defence, fending them all off by herself with a tourney sword.” 

Lord Glover let out a huff of a laugh and shook his head fondly. It seemed to Robb as if this was the first time he heard this part of the story...and as if he knew Jon’s mother.  _ Was she of the north? _

“She was a noblewoman,” Jon mumbled. 

“She was,” the princess affirmed. “She took the man back to her tent, cleaned his wounds and introduced him to her brothers that night. That same night, Lord Whent threw a feast and your mother saw the squires there. She pointed them out to her brothers. Also there that night, was your father. I was there too…” she turned to her husband. “As was Ethan. None of us spoke to each other that night though. Then late on the afternoon of the second day a mystery knight joined the lists.” 

Robb found himself leaning forward. 

“None of us knew who this mystery knight was,” Princess Elia said. “All we knew was that he was short, his armour was ill-fitting and his voice loud. Rhaegar and I sat below the king. The mystery knight challenged three knights that day. One from House Haigh, another from House Blount and the last a Frey. He beat each one, taking their horses and their armour. I had never particularly liked the Freys,” she teased. “Old Walder was older than my mother and yet a bigger degenerate I had never seen, so I cheered the mystery knight just to spite the old man who sat across from me.” She had a glint in her eye as she told them this. It even made Jon smile. “No one particularly liked any of the knights so the people cheered the mystery knight too,” she continued. “When the three knights sought to ransom back their horses and armour, the mystery knight boomed through his helm,  _ ‘‘Teach your squire honor, that shall be ransom enough.’  _ Once the defeated knights chastised their squires sharply, their horses and armour were returned. That night, Robert Baratheon and Richard Lonmouth, Rhaegar’s squire, swore to uncover the mystery knight. The king, half-mad with fear of treachery from those closest to him, swore that the mystery knight was Ser Jaime Lannister who defied his order to return to King’s Landing with the queen and Prince Viserys.” 

Robb knew this. The Kingslayer had joined the Kingsguard at Harrenhal. 

“Did he?” he asked. “Was it the Kingslayer?”

“No,” Princess Elia said. “It was not. When morning came, the mystery knight did not join the lists. That only drove the Mad King madder and he sent the kingsguard and Rhaegar to find the mystery knight, declared traitor. According to the story most people know...the mystery knight was never found. The kingsguard only found his shield but one person did find the knight. Your father found her.”

“My mother was the knight?” 

“Your mother was the knight.” 

Jon looked at Robb and laughed. 

“Your mother was betrothed to a man she did not care for and your father...well…” She cleared her throat. “I cannot say I know what transpired between them there,” she said. “But your father left Harrenhal caring for your mother and your mother must have felt something of the same for him for she went to great lengths to be with him. A year after the tourney the two of them married in the godswood of the very same castle.”

“He can’t have!” Robb found himself exclaiming. “That would mean he married Jon’s mother before mine and-” He could not bring himself to say the next words.  _ That would make Jon legitimate and me the bastard.  _

Princess Elia smiled kindly at him and said, “All is not as you think. The war broke out after the two of them disappeared. Your uncle Brandon and Ethan rode to King’s Landing to demand Lady Lyanna’s return. Your uncle of course had a coarse manner of speaking. He threatened Rhaegar and found himself in the cells of the Mad King.” She sighed wearily. “I am sure you know what transpired next. The Mad King summoned your grandfather and the fathers of all the men who rode south with your uncle and he killed them all but for Ethan. Sometimes he liked to keep witnesses of his crimes behind, you see,” she confessed. “It made him happy to torture people. Some to the death and some while still alive.” 

Lord Glover had a white-knuckled grip on the sides of the chair he sat on but he said nothing more. 

_ Jon is younger than me,  _ Robb thought.  _ His mother was alive after Father married my mother…. _

“And if that was not enough, he called for the heads of your father and Robert,” Princess Elia continued. “And so the war began.” 

“What does this have to do with my mother?” Jon asked again. 

“When the war started in earnest,” Princess Elia went on, “Your father returned to the fray but he left his wife, with the three men he could trust with his life and the life of the child your mother carried. You know how the war ended. Rhaegar was defeated, King’s Landing was sacked, they killed my daughter and killed an innocent child in place of my son. Their only crime was being the children of Rhaegar and having a claim on the Iron Throne. When the war was over-” 

Martyn Cassel burst forth into the room. He looked at Lord Glover in horror. “Princess,” he said, panting and shutting the door behind him. “Please.” 

Princess Elia smiled sadly. “It’s time Martyn,” she said. “Robert is dead. It’s time Jon knew the truth.”

Cold dread climbed up Robb’s spine.  _ What does Jon have to do with the death of the king?  _

“What truth?” Jon demanded.

“Son…” Lord Glover said.

“Will someone tell me what’s going on?” Jon shouted, jumping out of his seat. “Why won’t anyone tell me who my mother is?” 

“After the war ended,” Princess Elia tried again, this time standing herself and moving close to Jon. “Lord Stark and his companions, Martyn and Ethan among them, travelled to Dorne with me to the tower where your mother had given birth to you. There, on her dying bed, she made him promise to protect you from Robert Baratheon and his ilk.”

Jon’s brow furrowed in confusion. Robb looked at Martyn’s crestfallen face. 

“Your mother,” she said, “was Lady Lyanna Stark.” 

“You're lying,” Jon accused. “She was my father’s sister and he would-”

“Your father,” Princess Elia said louder than Jon, “was Prince Rhaegar of House Targaryen.” 

Jon’s mouth fell open and Robb felt his gut fall to the floor.

“You are the trueborn son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark,” Princess Elia said more forcefully. “You are a prince of this realm and my son’s brother.” 

Jon stumbled away from her with a glazed look in his eye. Robb wanted to move to him to steady him but he found his own legs wouldn’t work.  _ Jon is not my brother.  _

“My father…”Robb said. “He lied.” 

“There is honour in some lies, boy,” Martyn Cassel answered him.

_ My father... _ Robb thought,  _ he never betrayed Mother. _

“Rhaegar raped her…”Jon carped.

“No,” Princess Elia sighed, “He married her.” 

“She was betrothed!” 

“To a man she did not want.” 

“He was married!” Jon shouted. “He was married to you,” he said more softly, crying now.

“He was.” 

“But they said he raped her-” 

“People drew their own conclusions during the war,” she said. “This narrative suited Robert and by the time Ned knew of the truth...Robert would have killed you, Jon. They would have done to you what they did to my children. Lord Stark saw their bodies and Lyanna heard the news. You were even smaller than my Aegon. I held you that day. You were so tiny but they would have killed you, Jon. Rhaegar couldn’t let them. Your mother couldn’t let them...Ser Gerold, Arthur, Os, Ned...they couldn’t let them kill you. Rhaegar was dead. His honour could die with him so long as you lived.” 

“Ser Gerold Hightower?” Robb asked. “Do you mean Ser Arthur Dayne too? And Ser Oswell Whent?” His father had told them the story of how Ser Arthur Dayne was the greatest swordsman he had ever seen and how he would have killed him had Lord Howland Reed not saved his life. “But Father killed them.” 

“He did not,” Princess Elia said. Robb learnt then that Prince Rhaegar left them there to protect his aunt and Jon. “Lyanna entrusted her son to Lord Stark and Ser Gerold would never have bent the knee to Robert, not when Rhaegar’s sons were alive and Robert would not let them live in defiance of him. I needed all three of them alive...so I sent them to Essos to find my son.”

“They’re alive…” 

“I would hope so,” Princess Elia replied. “They found my boy and raised him. Only death could separate them from him now.” 

Jon collapsed into his chair again. “People died because of them...” 

“No,” Princess Elia choked. “They died because of the Mad King.” 

“Why didn’t she say anything?” he demanded hotly. “She could have stopped it. She could have told Fath-” Jon heaved heavily as he stood again, red eyed and furious. Robb sprung over to him, holding him back but Jon was not on the attack. He was just...it seemed in a daze. “She could have told her brother-” 

Princess Elia tapped Robb’s shoulder and asked him to move. 

“It was not your fault,” she told Jon, pulling him down to her. “None of it is your fault.” 

“Why don’t you hate me?” he asked her when she let him go. “You should hate me. I am alive. I am  _ her  _ son and...you should hate me.” 

“I swore to love you the day your mother died,” she told him. “You lost your mother and I lost my children. We needed each other, you and I.” The princess leaned her forehead against Jon’s. “You may not be of my womb,” she said, “but you have always been of my heart.” 

Robb could only stand there wishing his mother was still alive.  _ Father never betrayed you,  _ Robb thought _ but Rhaegar did her…  _ Would his mother have died more peacefully if she knew his father had never betrayed her? Would she have been kinder to Jon?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! I hope you are still here. After writing nearly 400,000 published words in the ASOIAF universe in the last 6 months of 2020 (not including probably another 100,000 in outlined text) I thought I’d give myself a few weeks’ break from writing. That obviously didn't happen since I started writing a side story during my holiday lol. But if I left you in a bit of a lurch waiting to see what happens next here, I apologise. Updates will probably be on a weekly or fortnightly basis moving forward as I am now back at work but fear not, I have every intention to finish this story. I have the very last scene mapped out but the journey to getting there may change as it has with the inclusion of this chapter.  
> I had originally only planned to do 2000 words of Robb’s reaction to the news about Jon before focusing on Jon for the rest of the chapter. Instead, I found that I ended up writing 3000 words focused entirely on Robb even before the reveal. Sometimes the words run away with me. I thought it warranted here though. I want us to get to know Robb the son and brother before he becomes Robb the Lord later on. I think knowing how much he cares for his family (and the expectations he places on his own shoulders) will go some way in helping us understand how difficult a (controversial) decision he makes later on is for him.  
> For now, sit back and enjoy the ride because these characters won’t lol.


	37. Jon

**Jon**

Jon sat on one of the benches in the courtyard and placed his head in his hands. It had been an hour since Princess Elia told him the truth of who he was. If he were being honest, he _assumed_ it’d been an hour and he assumed she told him the truth. Were it not so, Lord Glover and Martyn Cassel would have countered her. They did not. In truth, neither of them could meet his eyes. They had all lied to him for years. Martyn most of all...at least of all those who were in the room. Father...Lord Stark lied most of all and to the most people. He had made Jon believe he was his son and that, he thought, was the greatest hurt of all. He allowed Jon to believe and build dreams. 

Jon had hopes when he was a child that Father would one day look at him with love and bestow upon him the name Stark. Jon would stand beside him, his son in both blood and name. He still held on to that dream even when he grew older and it grew far-fetched. After all, Father....the man he knew as Father, had granted him lands, set him up to be lord and told him of his pride when Jon thwarted the Bolton bastard. That recognition alone had changed his life. Giving his name would only add glee upon Jon’s glee. 

The truth however, was that he would never be what he coveted most - Jon Stark. He was...he was...the son of a man derided across the kingdoms and a woman he knew all his life as his aunt...a woman they all thought of as innocent of Rhaegar’s crimes. _She ran off with him and so many died because of it._

 _How does a man come to terms with learning his whole life is a lie,_ Jon wondered. _How did a man deal with his dreams turning to ash in his mouth?_ On and on the questions whirled in his head. 

Jon had stormed out of the room and ran for the godswood when Princess Elia spoke to him so softly of her love for him. He could not bear it any longer. Any of it. Not the warmth in her eyes, the love in her voice, the strength with which she held him. He could not do it. Not after years of icy looks and sneering dismissals from Catelyn Stark. He felt as if he could not breathe. He felt...he felt too much; all of it beyond description until all he could do was run in flight. 

Ghost fell in with him until the two of them seemed to have become one in their flight. It was something that seemed to happen with unsettling frequency... this joining of their minds. 

Sometimes, Jon dreamt strange dreams of things that happened beyond his surroundings, things that only proved true upon his wakening. Just the other night he felt himself padding north, veering off from the Wolfswood, beyond the abandoned tower on the kingsroad and into the woods that started south of Long Lake. Ghost had been gone, off with Shaggydog for days at that point. Jon saw men camped there and he remembered, more than all else, the sigil of the giant breaking off from his chains. The Umbers arrived in Winterfell just a day and a half later. 

The dreams came when he was sleeping. When he was awake, he could be sitting with his brothers, talking of the most banal of matters or he could be locked away with Maester Luwin, who was both maester and steward in Vayon Poole’s absence. He’d be counting coins and talking of grain stores. Most often though, he was with Robb talking of the war they’d soon embark upon when it would come upon him suddenly. 

He’d feel a deep hunger for prey...sometimes a red deer that stank of fear or a great elk proud and defiant. The need to kill and fill his belly with fresh meat and hot dark blood would be overwhelming. His mouth would begin to water with the thought. 

It was a connection he could not explain nor understand. He was not only the son of the man who brought chaos to Westeros, he was a monster. That or he was mad. _As mad as the Mad King. How fitting,_ he reflected bitterly. 

He stopped deep in the godswood and howled, lips curled, teeth bared, feeling every bit as wolfish as his companion. And then it seemed as if his surroundings fell away and he was left not with the hunger or anger of a wolf but with the gaping emptiness of a grief that drowned him; a grief for the life he wanted, coveted, as Ned Stark’s son. 

Then came the anger in blinding, hot lashes. He was back in the halls of the Great Keep, making his way to his room when _she_ appeared before him. _“_ _What good are you?”_ she sneered at him. _“I know bastards are black of heart…”_

Clenching his teeth, he flexed his sword hand. It shook with rage and hatred. Dark, black, hatred of her, and of the existence he’d had to live under her shadow. And now she was gone. He would never get to see her face as he told her he was not a bastard and that she had never any cause to hate him. Searing tears sprung into his eyes. He always thought she hated him for a crime that was not his. To learn now that she hated him for no true reason at all...He was gripped with fury. He pummelled his shaking fist into the nearest tree. Once, twice. Using both hands alternately he began to pound his fists into the trunk with abandon. _He could have told her. He could have told her and she wouldn’t have made me feel so small._ He remembered every time she sneered at him, every time she ignored him and made him feel unwanted. He grew angrier at all who had ever dismissed him as a bastard and then at those who put him in the position he was in. The two most selfish people he could imagine. The two who had caused all this. Thousands died for them, thousands more were left to believe a story that was not true. How much suffering came from their foolishness? They left their son to be raised by a bastard. And Elia… 

Jon’s knees gave way. His rage receded. Then came the tremors. He looked down at his hands. His knuckles were bloodied. The pain came upon him suddenly. He must have staggered from the godswood to the bench he found himself upon. Ghost had stayed in the godswood with one of his brothers. 

At least _he_ had brothers...true ones. Not just cousins...but Ghost was different he knew. He was larger, quieter, the only one with a white coat, the only one with red eyes... _He was the one Father said was driven out._

The maester’s turret was not far. He could get his hands seen to. Maester Luwin wouldn’t be there though judging from the new arrivals. Bolton men. As was customary, Robb would be meeting with the arriving lord first before showing him to his rooms. The maester and Martyn or Hal Mollen would be by his side. Sometimes Jory was there too. 

“What do you have to look so sullen about?” 

Jon raised his eyes to look up at Theon Greyjoy. He had never liked the heir to Pyke. He had a way of looking as though he knew some secret jest that only he was privy to. And hostage he may be but he had a way of making Jon feel even more below him in his own home. 

“On your way, Greyjoy,” Jon barked.

“And since when does the heir to Pyke take orders from you, Snow?” 

Jon had always hated that name. He’d learnt to take it on, even accept it as his armour as the Imp advised but something about it still got under his skin. Stark, Greyjoy, Snow. Where others wore their names, Jon was branded for all to see as bastard. Except he was not... _except it doesn’t matter._

“Cat got your tongue?” 

Infused with rage, Jon barreled into him, stopping momentarily only to pick up a training sword someone had left lying around. His eyes darkened. He hammered the sword into Theon’s shoulder, revelling in the howl that broke out from his throat. The sword was blunt but it was heavy. He drove him back, not caring at all that he was unarmed. He did not care for the tone of his words and Jon found he could care less about the pain he was subjecting him to. How ever hard Jon hit him, it would not come close at all to how he felt so he went on and on and on and on until his whole arm shook with the impact of his sword clanging with live steel and the strong arm that wielded it. 

“Did you not hear him yield?” Martyn Cassel bellowed at Jon. 

_No,_ he realised. He looked down to see Theon Greyjoy sat on the ground, nose bloodied. He was clutching his belly. 

“Since when do you attack an unarmed man?” Old Martyn demanded. “Is that what I taught you?” For all they had always called him Old Martyn, Martyn Cassel, though ancient, was as stout as his brother, Ser Rodrik, and just as fearsome whenever he joined them in the training ground. He loomed over Jon. 

A crowd was building around them Jon noticed. _How long had they been there?_

“Look at the state of you,” Martyn continued, scanning Jon. 

Theon Greyjoy was rubbing his cheek. 

“Are you a man or an animal?” he muttered, low enough for only Jon to hear. 

It was the wrong question to ask, Jon thought. He wondered the same. 

“Is this what I taught you?” he asked again. 

Martyn leaned in to him then and said in a low, terse, voice. “Look around you. Every man here is taking note of your dealings. No man will follow a lord who cannot control his rage. You are angry, I know. But you do not take it out on the wrong person.” 

“The hell was that for?” Theon Greyjoy broke in. 

Jon looked at him and the sorry sight he made on the floor. The eyes of the men, especially those who were not of Winterfell, burned into his back. 

“I’m sorry,” he muttered. “I shouldn’t have done that.” Jon extended a hand out to him. 

“Damn right, you shouldn’t,” Theon carped back at him but took his hand and rose to his feet.. “A man should deserve what he gets. Now, will you tell me why in seven hells you came at me as if _I_ was the Kingslayer?” 

Jon saw Shadd leading his horse back to the stables. “I...need to go,” he said before he ran at the guard, pushed him away and clambered up on his horse. As he did so, Robb entered the courtyard with the pale-eyed Lord Bolton beside him. 

“Jon…” he said, noticing Theon’s disheveled state. He made a step toward him but Martyn held him back. 

“Let him go,” Jon heard him say as he galloped out of the Hunter’s Gate and out into the Wolfswood. He needed to be alone, to be away from prying eyes and if he was honest, away from his thoughts and the pain that cinched at his heart. He could, he realised, as the wind snapped against his face, escape neither of the latter two. The pain was unrelenting and the thoughts came hot and heavy. 

He was not a bastard. The news should have made him happy, overjoyed even but it didn’t. How could it? He was the result of a union that killed thousands. 

He was not the son of the man he built his entire life around. That realisation came with renewed anger at Eddard Stark who had allowed his wife to treat him with such abhorrence. _Why didn’t he tell her? He could have told his own wife._

If someone had any cause to hate him, it was Princess Elia who lost her daughter and had to send her son away because Rhaegar chose to protect Lyanna Stark. 

Then came more questions. _Was Father ever going to tell me? Why would he return to help the very man he knew would see me dead? Why did he let the stories about Rhaegar spread if he would tell me?_

When he finally stopped in a clearing, the midday sun bathed his surroundings in warm light. Jon tied his horse and leaned his back against a tree. He looked down at his knuckles. The blood was beginning to dry on them but the pain still burnt. He flexed the fingers on both hands. He’d see to them later. He had bigger issues than two scuffed hands. 

Ned Stark was not his father. Robb was not his brother, nor was Bran or Rickon. His brother was another man entirely. 

Thoughts of him returned him to a moment he thought he’d forgotten. One he had no true cause to remember. They were children. Jon and Robb were sparring, not as the two boys they were. Never as children. When they sparred, they were heroes from the songs. 

“I’m Prince Aemon the Dragonknight,” Jon would call out. 

“Well, I’m Florian the Fool,” Robb would shout. 

“I am Ser Ryam Redwyne,” Jon would rejoin.

“I am the Young Dragon,” Robb would taunt. 

But on this morning, Jon got there first, winning as he did. “I am Lord of Winterfell,” he gloated. 

“You can’t be Lord of Winterfell,” Robb said as he got up. “You’re bastard-born. My lady mother says you can’t ever be the Lord of Winterfell.”

Tears stung in Jon’s eyes now as then. 

It was Aegon Targaryen who had tried to comfort him. “But you can be lord of another castle,” he said. “The king can make anyone lord. If I was a king, I’d make you a lord...A good king should have good men around him and you are really good with swords.” Jon remembered smiling at him for a moment until he remembered Aegon was a bastard just like him. He reminded him _Sand_ was his name, before he slunk off. A Sand had never been king before just as a Snow had never either. Jon knew that even at six. 

One memory only sprung another. “Congratulations, _brother,”_ Aegon Targaryen had said to him when he learnt news of Jon’s proposed lordship before he corrected himself with a stutter. “I mean...as one bastard to another,” he amended. 

_Brother._ When Jon thought of the word he thought of auburn curls, laughing blue eyes and the warmth of his brothers. He never once pictured purple hair and eyes, tanned skin and eyes that stayed on him longer than was proper. Even with what he knew now, the word brother did not spring up thoughts of Aegon Targaryen who had no cause to care for him at all. 

The girls were not his sisters either. Neither Sansa nor Arya who in her loyalty to him had never once distinguished him as _half_ -brother. 

He’d had a half-sister he supposed. One who was so cruelly ripped away from her mother. One he’d never known. He’d known the girls and they were now at risk of the same fate that befell Rhaenys Targaryen surrounded as they were by enemies...or so he assumed. They still had no word of Arya. 

His thoughts returned to the night she snuck into his room and told him of Aegon Targaryen. With a jolt his head spun, his thoughts a jumble.

“ _Would you ever hate me?”_ she’d asked him suddenly. 

Jon remembered chuckling and then studying her fearful face. She chewed her lip nervously while she waited. Her eyes were downcast. 

“Aegon can never tell people who he is,” she explained. “But at least he knows who he is. If you were in his position…if someone had to lie to you about who you were, would you hate everyone who hid it from you?”

 _She knew. She knew and withheld it from me._ Arya had never hidden anything from him. _She knew._ It felt like the greatest betrayal. Perhaps Father...Lord Stark, protected the memory of his sister, his men obeyed him and Elia did it to protect him too but Arya...she trusted him with knowledge of who Aegon was. Her loyalty should have been to him! She should have told him. 

Then he felt something he had not all day - guilt. He’d felt righteous anger at so many. His heart had broken and his dreams scattered but he hadn’t felt guilt once...until now. For all he knew, Arya could be as dead as the rest of their household and he sat here angry at her. He knew if he could have her home and safe, even knowing she had kept this from him, he would. He wouldn’t even ask her about it so long as she was safe and alive. He’d do anything to have her home...anything to hear her finish a sentence with him. 

He sat where he was until the evening sun began to cast long shadows on the ground and the air began to grow cold. He knew he should return but he could not bring himself to do so. 

Life in the north had taught him long ago however, that the cold could sneak upon a man without his knowledge and before he knew it, the chill would have him feverish and carry him off to illness or death. He went about building himself a fire. 

_That will do,_ he thought as it began to blaze. The sloping rays of the setting sun gave the sky a tinge as warm as his fire. Jon knew the path back to Winterfell like the back of his hand. He could return there in the dark if necessary but what awaited him? Winterfell was no closer to being his now than it ever was. In fact, it was his even less so now than it was when he awoke as Ned Stark’s son this morning. Bastard or no he was the son of the lord. Now... _I am the son of the man Winterfell went to war with. I am the son of a man hated from the Wall to the bogs. A man the world knows as a raper._

Even being a bastard was preferable to that, Jon thought. At least as Ned Stark’s bastard, the north gave him deference due to his father’s name and would even recognise him as lord for it. _What would they do when they learnt of this?_

He couldn’t stop the places his mind went to though, even with that bitter taste in his mouth. _What would my life have been had he won?_ If his mother had lived, would Elia have cared for him the way she had all his life? Would he have had this name or another...one more Targaryen in nature? He’d have been a prince... of Summerhall if he recalled the ranks properly. He’d have had riches and he would have been trained by the knights of legend. Perhaps he’d even sit on the Small Council one day. He would never have known the life of a bastard and Catelyn Stark would never have dismissed him a day in her life. In fact...she would have had to curtsy to him. 

The mare he’d swiped from Shadd reared her head suddenly and stood stock still, with only her ears moving. The horse let out a nervous nicker and paced as far as the ties would allow her. her ears flicked back and forth and then she rolled her eyes.

Jon felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. The sun had set a while ago leaving only a faint glow of purple against the darkening sky out in the west. The moon was bright above him in the blackening sky and he could make out the stars Maester Luwin had taught him as a boy. Already the Sword of the Morning was visible as were the Ice Dragon and the Shadowcat. 

He stood to quieten the horse and calm it even as his own insides twisted with growing discomfort. He patted his body to double-check for the weapons he knew he did not carry. Something was scaring the horse.

“Shh, girl,” he whispered, stroking the mare’s mane. 

That helped naught. The mare reared up in a panic, neighed loudly and tried to run away. Jon turned around to see what had frightened it so. 

A shadowcat snarled out of the shadows. 

Against all that his mind screamed at him, Jon did not run. Uncle Benjen had told them the best thing to do when a predator made its way toward you was to make no sudden movements. _Ghost,_ he thought, hoping, for once, their connection was true and not a sign of his madness. _Come to me, boy._

Even if he came, wherever he was, Ghost would have his work cut out. What he had in brawn the shadowcat would possess in speed. 

Jon kept his eyes on it. 

It slinked toward him, eyes glowing in the dark. Then Jon saw it’s tongue brush out of its mouth teasingly, as if its mouth watered at the feast before it. It had two options of course. The horse and him. The horse would be a fuller meal but he realised he stood in front of it. To move now would be to make a sudden movement. He was done for whatever he did. 

Uncle Benjen told them shadowcats seldom ate men while they could find other prey. Jon looked back at the skittish mare that was so desperate to escape her ties. _Just because shadowcats don’t like the meat of men doesn’t mean it won’t kill me to get to its true goal,_ Jon thought. The shadowcat could disembowel him with one paw even if he did have a weapon. Slowly he took one step away from the horse. His goal was an errant branch not too far from the fire. _Perhaps if I can set it alight…_

His lungs began to burn as if he was running strenuously. His legs did too and Jon knew Ghost was coming. Madness or not, he knew. _But when?_

_Hopefully not when I’m torn to shreds._

The shadowcat stalked closer, Jon took another step toward the stick. _Five more steps,_ he thought. Maybe six _but then I’d need to bend._

Suddenly, a dark shadow leaped at the shadowcat’s middle and the two dark creatures one large and the other slender began to roll. Jon recognised the dark shadow with a jolt. It was the same wolf that had come to his rescue as he hunted the Bolton bastard. It was the one that killed the stag and watched them the day they discovered the wolves. 

The wolf was much larger than the shadowcat and even with its limp, barely noticeable in its stance now, was stronger. The shadowcat let out a rumbling growl the wolf answered with snarl. Then came the shadowcat’s furious screams, the wolf had punctured something judging from the blood Jon saw gushing. The shadowcat was large but the wolf...Jon had seen it in action before. It was larger than the largest pony in the stables and the deadliest creature Jon had ever seen. Before long the shadowcat was dead.

The horse nickered once more.

“Jon,” he heard someone shout. 

“Jon, where are you?” 

_Robb._

Ghost burst into the clearing. 

Grey Wind was at his heels, Summer and Shaggy too but Jon only had eyes for the great grey wolf. It stalked toward him, golden eyes gleaming and licked the dried blood off his hand. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jon Snow is a calm and collected guy...most of the time. He is also capable of maddening anger that comes with an almost superhuman strength that I certainly hadn’t expected from “slender and graceful” Jon (Bran’s description of him). In the books he strangles Ser Alliser Thorne so hard that he lifts the knight off the floor. He also blanks out completely while sparring with Iron Emett until he only comes back from his memories to see Emmett’s shield half in splinters and men pulling him off. Is it Ghost? Is it the wolf blood? We all know Brandon was wild. Is it the dragon’s blood? Aegon V managed to pull Dunk out of the water while still a young boy. Is it both? In this scenario, Theon just happened to say the wrong thing at the wrong time.
> 
> Shadowcats are found all over Westeros and though I couldn’t find mention of one in the north (well behind the wall) we know Varymyr Sixskins shared a skin with a shadowcat so I extrapolated and decided that the odd shadowcat would be found in the wolfswood. After all, there’s a direwolf there… 
> 
> I know Ghost feels super uncomfortable around Varymyr’s shadowcat and Jon thinks it could kill Ghost but my headcanon is the limping wolf is much bigger than Ghost and also plot ™ 
> 
> This is part 1 of 2...I’d outlined a longer chapter but this was all I managed to write today. I debated posting the two parts separately but I thought you’d appreciate something sooner than nothing for longer lol.  
> Also, it’s been 4 months exactly since this story’s first ever chapter. I never imagined the places it would take me or how large it would grow. Thank you for all your kind comments, your ideas and encouragement along the way. It inspires me to keep writing


	38. Jon

**Jon**

“Jon…” 

“Don’t mind him,” Jon laughed, stroking the great wolf’s fur. “I believe we are old friends by now.” 

“I came as soon as I could,” Robb said, unsurely regarding the wolf. “Grey Wind and I were coming to find you when Ghost came speeding past with the rest of them. Grey Wind sensed the danger too and I…”

“You?” 

Robb shook his head and dismounted. “It doesn’t matter, I see you were in no true danger at all.” 

“Think again,” Jon told him and pointed to the carcass of the shadowcat not too far from him. The other wolves were already regarding it. 

The great wolf moved away from Jon and towards the trees. The other wolves followed him into the woods. 

“You would have found me with my guts hanging out, if it were not for him. He seems to be making a habit of saving my life.” Something about this made Jon feel at ease.

“Well, he has my thanks for it. I couldn’t imagine having to do any of this without you. Though I must say…” Robb dismounted from his horse and tied him under the tree opposite to where Shadd’s mare was now standing still. “I envy you the quiet you have here.” 

Jon scoffed but it seemed Robb did not hear him. 

“After you left, a Bolton man stabbed a Cerwyn man in the Smoking Log. Theon swears he will make you pay for what you did-”

Jon scoffed again. 

Rob grinned. “I told him he was welcome to try. Oh, and Martyn says you’ll be sleeping in the stables for a week.” 

Jon shrugged. It wasn’t something new. All three of them had been forced to sleep in the stables for some indiscretion or other. Martyn Cassel was harder on them than his brother. 

“That’s not all,” Robb went on. “The Greatjon is already talking my ear off about leading the vanguard…” Robb moved to sit down near Jon and extended his hands out to the fire. “Let’s just say he will be difficult to manage. I feel as if he’s just waiting for me to flounder before he destroys me.” 

“The Greatjon blusters but he is true. He considers Uncle Benjen a brother,” Jon told him. “Besides, his new bride is a Hornwood. The Hornwoods are tied to the Glovers who are tied to the Mormonts. Lord Glover’s voice will go some way in managing them. The Flints... _ all of them,”  _ Jon added for good measure, “are sworn Stark men, loud as they may be. The mountain clans too. We won’t be doubting Howland Reed’s loyalty, nor that of his men, not after what we learnt this morning. The Manderlys are yours, the Karstarks will not cease to remind everyone they  _ are  _ Starks... It’s Lord Bolton you should watch,” Jon quipped, grabbing the wineskin Robb brought with him. “Father doesn’t trust him.” Jon had been in the room when Father...Lord Stark asked Jory to keep a close eye on Lord Bolton during his last visit. Eddard Stark did not believe Roose Bolton did not know of his son’s actions but had no proof against him.

“When we met this morning, he hardly said a word to me. He just stared at me…” 

“I couldn’t say what’s more unsettling, his whispery voice or his pale eyes.” 

“Definitely the room they have in the Dreadfort with all the skins,” Robb assured him as he laughed nervously. “Don’t assume I didn’t notice that you called him father,” Robb announced when they quited. “Father...you called him father.” 

Jon cleared his throat and flexed his fingers. His cuffed knuckles would scab soon. 

“You should know…”Robb said in a voice soft with affection, “What Princess Elia said this morning...it changes nothing. You will always be my brother. You have always been Ned Stark’s son and you will remain that way to me always.” 

Jon felt his throat grow thick with emotion. Words could not pass the lump that lodged itself there. He managed a lopsided smile and extended his hand in Robb’s direction. Robb reciprocated the gesture until they twined their hands and squeezed in communication. Jon’s thanks and Robb’s acceptance passed between them unspoken.

“I suppose I should take to calling you Your Highness now,” Robb needled. 

Jon rolled his eyes in a motion that reminded him so much of Arya at that moment. 

“A copper for your thoughts, Your Highness?” Robb asked later as they tucked into the saltbeef and bread Robb had pilfered from the kitchens. Acting lord or not, some habits die hard. 

Robb flicked a copper coin at Jon to prompt an answer. 

Jon caught it and flipped it in his hand. The coin bore the face and name of Robert Baratheon, as most coins he had seen in his life did. “What do you plan to do about Aegon’s letter?” he asked instead.

“Well, seeing as Lord Manderly sent a raven this morning to inform me that Arianne Martell is being hosted in New Castle, I suppose I will listen to the offer he means to make. We have a common cause against the Lannisters and-” 

“Don’t bend the knee,” Jon blurted, voicing a thought burgeoning in his mind. 

Robb gave him a questioning look. 

“The Lannisters hold…” Jon struggled with the next word and settled for, “Lord Stark.” He cleared his throat. “They have the girls too. Lord Glover was right in saying we should keep knowledge of the queen’s treason quiet until we get Lord Stark back…” 

“Father,” Robb corrected. “After everything he deserves at least that much from you. He risked his honour, his marriage, his life for you.”

“He needn’t have risked his marriage,” Jon found himself saying bitterly. “Had your mother known…” He stopped himself when he saw Robb’s chapfallen face. Robb had always tried to spare Jon his mother’s harsh words and it didn’t do now to scratch at his brother’s unhealed wound. Robb was trying to hold a family together while preparing for a war. He’d not had much time to grieve for his mother before he fell headlong into the chaos they found themselves in. Lady Stark’s faults died with her. Robb, his brother, his friend, was still alive.

“It doesn’t matter,” Jon said instead. “What matters is that the Lannisters assume he is your biggest concern. They have to believe that if they free the girls and...Father that you will side with them against Aegon. With Aegon’s return they  _ need  _ you now more than you need them. You are Robb Stark, the blood of Winterfell and Riverrun. You share your blood with the Lord of the Eyrie. You will have three kingdoms at your back to their two, maybe three if The Reach joins them-“

“The Reach stood for House Targaryen until the end.”

“Even better for us. The Lannisters cannot know of what Father did for...my mother.” It was the first time he had a name for the lady in his dreams. The first time he spoke of her with a sure knowledge of who she was. Granted, he didn’t know much about her except tales of her death, one story of her heroics and the fact that Eddard Stark had truly loved her - even if he was not Jon’s sire - but Jon finally had something to know her by. The thought of that caught in his throat. He cleared it to continue, overcome as he was. “The Lannisters cannot know what connects us to Aegon.”

“They will use it against father,” Robb confirmed, “As evidence of his treason. They will use the girls to keep Father quiet...” 

By now they both knew just what Eddard Stark would do for those he loved. 

“But knowing of what father did for you...what he did by sending the knights of the Kingsguard free…” Robb began laughing. “Can you believe that? All those years ago we used to beg Father and Princess Elia for stories about them.”

Jon remembered. Father did not like recalling what happened but always spoke highly of their prowess. Princess Elia, on the other hand, always indulged them. She told them about how Ser Gerold saved her from the Kingswood Brotherhood even with an arrow in his hand. Ser Arthur Dayne brought an end to them on the battlefield  _ and _ inspired the smallfolk who supported the brotherhood to his side by interceding for them with the king and winning them new rights and paying for what he took. She told them so many stories that Jon remembered, aged six, being able to draw Ser Oswell Whent’s helmet of the black bat with its spread wings. 

“Do you think, when this is all over, we’ll get to meet them?” Robb asked and for just that moment, they were boys again, playing at war and not living it. 

As they rode back to Winterfell, wolves trailing behind, this time including the great grey one, Jon felt lighter. So much had changed since the sun’s rising that morning, so much would change as well but for a while longer, he would still be just Jon Snow, bastard of Winterfell. The thought tickled him. Never in a million years had he ever thought he’d gladly hold on to that name. He’d dreamt so long about being highborn. Now he found, on the precipice of war, he wanted the comfort of a bastard’s name for just a while longer. Dragons did not do well this far north. Not when half the lords in Winterfell had lost loved ones in bringing down the last of them. 

“Princess Elia assures me that we only need to bide our time for a little while longer,” Robb said, filling the silence. “She seems sure we will get Father back.”

“And the girls?”

Robb’s smile dropped. “And the girls if we can.”  _ If they are alive,  _ went unsaid. For all they knew Arya was gone. It was a thought Jon refused to allow to take root. It seemed Robb did the same. They  _ would  _ see her again and then he’d tell her she should have told him what she knew. Then they’d forget it. 

“They will be guarded more heavily than father seeing as they have to maintain some freedoms to them,” Robb continued. “Sansa is to be a bride to their king after all. Lord Glover thinks it’ll be easier to free Father too. He says from his own experience of the black cells, that they weren’t used very often even then and had few guards. It’s the only thing the he and Princess Elia seemed to agree on. She says they’re closest to the secret tunnels King Maegor built. ‘ _ They’re known only to dragons and spiders _ ,’ she says.”

“She seems sure.” 

“Given the sort of strings she’s been pulling in secret our whole lives, I’m inclined to believe her. Although…” Rob pondered aloud, “I cannot imagine what things will be like tonight in the Glovers’ rooms. Lord Glover is beyond wroth. In some ways, I imagine their bed will be colder than Father’s would be if we learnt of this while my mother was still alive. Gah,” Robb grumbled. “I wish she’d known.”

\--

Jon’s ribs ached as he awoke on his bed of hay. Theon had ambushed him in the Great Keep the night before and paid him back with interest before they settled in Father’s solar with Robb and drank more than was wise. Jon raised a hand to the back of the head that throbbed in pain and fished out pieces of straw. His stomach grumbled. 

Martyn Cassel was waiting for him when he stepped out of his stall.

“Sleep well?” he asked.

“Never better. I thank you, your graciousness, for your the comfortable lodgings you have granted to me,” Jon bowed mockingly. 

“A week can easily become two.” Martyn Cassel raised a defiant, thick, brow at Jon and stood. As tall as he was, Jon was still a good few inches shorter than the old master-at-arms. “Come with me,” he ordered. “And order your wolf to join us.” 

They walked in silence until they made it as far as the arch of the guesthouse.“You mind telling me why in seven hells you have that monster within these walls?” Old Martyn demanded. 

Jon looked back at the great grey, they were still yet to name him. The great wolf made for a menacing shadow behind them. Ghost was joined by Grey Wind. Shaggy and Summer raced ahead. 

“You might want to be careful,” Jon whispered. “I don’t assume he takes well to being called a monster. I watched him tear a shadowcat apart last night. I’d be careful if I was you.” 

To his credit, Old Martyn looked unfazed. “Have him keep guard at the gates.” 

“I was born in Winterfell,” he said fondly, when they were deep into the godswood. “My father was Lord Edwyle’s master-at-arms and my mother was a lady-in-waiting to your great-grandmother Lady Marna.” Old Martyn smiled. “When my mother was done with her duties, she would bring me out to watch my father train his men. Lady Marna used to do the same for her boy Rickard. They carried Rickard and I at the same time, you see and as we grew up, we grew up to be inseparable. We sparred in the yard just as you and Robb do under Rodrik’s watchful eye. Except it was an entirely different man with whiskers who terrified us,” he added with mirth.

Jon couldn’t help but smile. It quickly turned into a grimace when he leaned forward. Theon gave as good as he got. 

“When Lord Edwyle died, I swore myself to my lord’s son, my childhood companion, and served him as the Captain of his Household guard. I was present at his wedding to your grandmother, Lady Lyarra. She was a fierce thing. Kind and with a biting wit. I married one of her cousins from the Flint side. She was a good, loving woman who gave me four boys. Only Jory is left to me from among them but they once ran around halls of Winterfell just as you and Robb did once and Bran and Rickon do today. My eldest, Donnor was of an age with your uncle Brandon and for the first five years of their lives were as inseparable as Rickard and I once were. Willam was a year younger than Ned but shared his quiet ways and the two made amiable enough companions until Ned’s departure for The Vale. Jory was a year older than Lyanna so  _ she  _ followed him around.” Old Martyn smiled wistfully. “I suppose you know something of Lyanna from Princess Elia’s story of the mystery Knight at Harrenhal. While it was news to me when Howland first told me, it was not at all surprising. Lyanna never let an injustice lie if she could do something about it. Lady Lyarra died when Lyanna was a little girl. She was left all alone in a household full of men but for her nurse Old Nan.” Martyn Cassel leaned over and whispered to Jon, as if he were about to impart great wisdom, “And by nurse I do not mean wet nurse at all. Nan was ancient even when  _ I _ was a little boy and that itself feels like centuries ago now.” He chuckled some more. 

“Lyarra wanted her sons to be worldly men. Her own father served as a sellsword in Essos for a time. Rickard did not have the same ambitions for his boys but he understood that looking beyond the north had its benefits.  _ ‘For too long, Martyn, we have kept ourselves to ourselves _ ,’ Rickard would say.  _ ‘The north is only as strong as its alliances _ , _ Martyn.’  _ He fostered Ned in the Vale, betrothed Brandon to a daughter of the Riverlands and wanted to tie the Stormlands to the North with Lyanna.” Martyn paused for a moment. “I suppose, had he known of Rhaegar’s desire to take her to wife, he might have accepted that too. Rickard wanted a powerful north more than anything-“

“Then perhaps she should have told him,” Jon commented bitterly, not sure who he was angry at now. 

“She...well, I suppose she had hoped to. Benjen says she left him a letter at Riverrun with one of the Stark men-at-arms after Brandon left to meet Rickard but...well, I’m not sure what came of the man or the letter.”

“Uncle Benjen knew?”

“He was the only one who did. He was the one who helped her go to the prince. The two of them were each other’s shadow, you see.When Lady Lyarra died, Brandon was already fostering in the Rills, Ned left not long after. Benjen was still too young to send away immediately so he tarried here a few more years before he was sent to foster at Last Hearth. Sometimes I believe that prepared him for life at the Wall. Anyway, Ben and Lyanna only had the other. They kept each other’s secrets as children. Ben was the one who helped source her armour at Harrenhal. To this day he blames himself for what befell them all. It’s why he joined the Night’s Watch. The poor boy seems to believe he has a crime to pay for. There is only one man who needed to pay for what befell Rickard and Brandon and  _ he _ died before we could kill him. And Rhaegar...well,” Martyn said disdainfully. “The man for all he is your sire…” Martyn shook his head. “It makes no matter. I brought you here to tell you of your mother. Lyanna was the diamond of Winterfell. With her brothers gone, she stayed and sat by her father’s side, watching and learning. Rickard was a man of justice, honour and dignity. For all little Lyanna was a wild thing who’d beg to be taught how to use a sword and bribe Benjen or Jory to teach her when she thought no one was looking, she soaked in the teachings her father intended for her brothers. Arya Underfoot reminds me of her.” Martyn smiled again and Jon found himself joining him. 

“At three-and-ten, Lyanna was bringing issues to her father on behalf of the smallfolk. My grey-eyed girl…” Martyn smiled once more into the silence. Jon looked at him to see tears in his eyes. “Whatever I say of her, it would not be enough. Lyanna had her grandmothers’ sharp wit and a temper that could only belong to her grandfather the Wandering Wolf. Underneath it all, however, she had a soft-heart. As you know, only Jory of my boys lived to become a man. At the loss of each of my sons, Lyanna would come to me in a flood of tears, clutching a bunch of the best flowers she could find. Her favourites were winter roses. When she could not form the words for her sobs, she’d hold me tight and promise that while she couldn’t take their place, she’d perform all the duties my sons would have to me. ‘ _ And when you grow old, I will look after you,’  _ she’d say.” Martyn wiped his eyes. “My darling girl. She was not only Rickard’s. She belonged to all of us. I was never blessed with daughters. I love Beth as if she was mine, but before her, there was your mother, Jon. My Lyanna was a rare girl and I wish more than anything she was still here. She loved you, boy.” Martyn Cassel put his hand on Jon’s shoulder and squeezed. “When we came upon her in that tower, her biggest worry was for you - your safety, your well-being…”

Jon felt his eyes mist over. For years he wondered about his mother - who she was, where she was, whether she had loved his father and more than anything, whether she had cared for him. 

“I wish she was here to see the man you’ve become,” Old Martyn continued. “She would have been so proud of you...hay in your hair notwithstanding. She was a troublesome sort herself. Had she been a boy, I presume she’d have spent quite a few nights in the stables herself.” He chuckled to himself as he fished more hay out of Jon’s curls. “I still see her in your eyes, in the shape of your face….frankly, if we’re honest, in all of you. You look nothing like the man who sired you and what a good thing for us,” he laughed. “I imagine Ned would have a great deal more to explain had you come out looking anything like Elia’s boy but I suppose Ned would have found a way for that too.” 

Martyn tightened his hold on Jon’s shoulder. “I know you are wroth with us all, boy. You certainly have reason to be. But you must remember this- Ned wasn’t much older than you are. At twenty, the poor boy had lost his older brother, the one born to be Lord of Winterfell, his lord father, and his only sister. His  _ little _ sister. And in his arms was the only thing that remained to him of her - you. He took you, named you son, soiled his own honour and that of the woman he married not a year before to protect you from those who would harm you. He brought  _ you  _ home first and created a rapture that never healed in his marriage, because  _ you  _ were more important to him than all that. He held  _ you _ in his arms, even before he did Robb, and he called  _ you  _ son before he returned to the child of his own loins. You and Robb were the only things to keep Ned among us. The boy was lost after the war. Alone. Sure, he would have done his duty to House Stark but  _ you,  _ the two of you, kept him among the truly living. He had the two of you to protect and raise and before long the girls arrived but before all of them, I want you to know, you were the first to cool Ned’s burning heart.” 

Jon found himself an hour later in front of Lyanna Stark’s statue in the crypts holding a bunch of winter roses. After they’d left the godswood, Martyn had taken him to Guard’s Hall for him to break his fast. When he was done, Martyn only said, “I told you, she liked winter roses best.” 

For a long time Jon merely stood in front of the statue, staring. For so long he told himself he wanted only to know who his mother was. Now he did, now he knew small things about her, he wished more than anything that she was alive.

_ I’m not very good with words,  _ he thought when he couldn’t think of words to begin with. So he placed the flowers at the foot of her statue and said, “I heard they were your favourites.” He always dreamt his mother was kind. His mother was according to Old Martyn. 

He heard the quiet shuffling of skirts when Rickon came bounding in. “Princess Elia promised to give me  _ a  _ golden dragon to show her the crypts,” he grinned. “A golden dragon! She says I won’t even be able to count how many sweets I can get with that!” 

Said princess, turned into the corner where they stood a few moments later. “Rickon,” she said softly, holding out a palm that held the promised coin, “Thank you for bringing me.” 

Rickon grabbed his coin and ran.

“He’d have brought you here for a copper coin,” Jon told her. “Or even the promise of an extra tart at dinner.” 

Elia laughed. “I only had dragons.” She stood beside him and looked up at his mother’s statue.  _ His  _ mother. Jon had a mother. Well, he always supposed he had a mother. Everyone did. But he  _ had  _ a mother. He knew who she was and she loved him, according to all who knew her. She didn’t leave him. 

Elia stared up at the statue for so long that Jon wasn’t sure she would speak. Until she did. 

“I waited outside your room all night,” she said. 

Jon rubbed the back of his neck, feeling sheepish all of a sudden. “I slept in the stables.”

“So I heard.” She turned to him, and inspected his now bandaged hands. “Perhaps Ethan was right. Perhaps this was something that only Ned should have told you. Perhaps if he did…” 

“I deserved to know,” Jon protested. “I just wish…”

“You wish Ned was your father,” she finished for him. “Rhaegar was not so bad.” 

Jon looked at her incredulously. 

“Oh I wished him dead more than a few times, rest assured. Yes, he was flawed but he was also a brilliant man. If he lived, if you knew the true him, you’d think the same.” 

“He had a brilliant wife,” Jon told her. “And he betrayed her.” 

Elia smiled kindly at him. Her eyes were warm. She moved to a small alcove with a tiny bench and tapped the space beside her.

“Your father was a complicated man, Jon. I will not tell you Rhaegar was a hero but he was not a villain either. More than that, however, if there is only one thing you take to heart about him, it is that he loved all his children deeply and that he cared deeply for your mother. I hear her name was the last word on his lips as he died.” She looked up at Lyanna Stark’s statue once more.

Jon flexed the fingers of his bandaged hands. 

“I was married to Rhaegar and even I cannot say I truly understood him but I will tell you of what I know. When I married him, House Targaryen only consisted of four people. Aerys, Rhaella, Rhaegar and Viserys. It was not always such a small house. On the night Rhaegar was born, House Targaryen comprised of King Aegon, his wife Betha Blackwood, their five children, and their two grandchildren. The future seemed bright, despite the troubles the king faced from his lords. Their dynasty seemed secure. After all, Rhaella was pregnant and about to give the royal house a new heir. Except, in one night, the realm lost its king, queen, and four of his children at the tragedy at Summerhall. While the castle burnt, Rhaella brought forth Rhaegar amidst the ruin of their family. Only she remained, along with her brother-husband and her father. Rhaegar seemed to carry the melancholy of that event deep in his heart. Even as a grown man, he’d sometimes disappear without guards to the castle of his birth to sit amongst its ghosts. He wanted to raise his house to the heights it once soared.” 

Elia told him of Rhaegar’s desire to secure the dynasty by increasing its numbers. “Only Dorne was tied irrevocably to him through me and my brothers, much as I love them,” she said, “didn’t make the most advantageous matches...or so Rhaegar thought. He wanted to betroth Rhaenys to Lord Tyrell’s boy. Aegon was too small for us to speak of who he wished to win over through him. Besides, the options weren’t great. Cersei was old enough to be his mother. The same was true of Lord Tully’s second daughter.” Jon learnt that Rhaegar felt having more children gave him more leverage with which to move against his father and secure the future of the Iron Throne. 

“In choosing your mother Rhaegar thought he found the mother of the third child he so coveted. For some reason,” she said cryptically, “Rhaegar was fond of saying, ‘ _ the dragon must have three heads.’  _ Instead he insulted both House Baratheon and Stark.” Her derision was clear on her face. “I will make no excuse for him on that front but by the time Brandon and Rickard Stark had died, the die was cast. Rhaegar had no choice but to fight Robert on the field. There was no stopping Robert - even though it was Ned who lost the most. The future of House Targaryen was at stake. Rhaegar instructed me to return to Dragonstone. I won’t lie to you and tell you that Rhaegar ever thought he would lose at The Trident. He hadn’t prepared us for loss because he hadn’t prepared for it himself. If he had, I suppose he would have taken your mother somewhere safer and ensured mine and the children’s safety too. It doesn’t mean  _ I  _ hadn’t thought about my own survival though. I planned to leave for Dragonstone and then for Sunspear, to the safety of my brothers. From there, I’d raise an army for my son using Rhaegar’s riches if House Targaryen fell. He maintained a separate fortune from his father’s you see… and kept it with the Iron Bank. For all his madness, Aerys’ treasury was always full until the bitter end but Rhaegar liked to plan ahead,  _ excepting the one time that he should have _ ,” she sniped. “In any case, Aerys’ riches meant little and less to me. If the Targaryens fell, I wouldn’t be able to access it myself. I’d planned to use Rhaegar’s fortunes to put his son upon the throne with my brothers by my side but for all my planning…” She shrugged her shoulders. “I couldn’t plan for the vindictiveness and the madness of Aerys Targaryen. When Rhaegar left, Aerys sent Rhaella and Viserys to Dragonstone but he kept me and the children as hostages to ensure the loyalty of my brothers and Dorne.” Jon watched her grit her teeth. “Rhaegar’s fortune still exists and it belongs to you and Aegon.” 

“I don’t want his money,” Jon carped. 

“No?” Elia arched her brow. “In that case I will save your portion for your children.” Then, in the detached tone he learnt she adopted whenever she spoke of sums with the steward at Deepwood Motte she continued. “Aegon will probably use his to begin the Iron Throne’s repayments to the Iron Bank, such,” she said, raising her finger, “is the burden of a man who seeks to rule. From the figures I have heard, the Crown is deep in debt to the Lannisters  _ and  _ the Iron Bank. When they fall from grace, and they will, I assure you. Their debts will remain.” For the first time in his life, Jon saw Princess Elia smirk cunningly. “You see,” she said conspiratorially, “many people will seek to buy my son when he inherits. They will try to buy power by paying off his debts while all the while, not knowing of his father’s investments. He couldn’t access them before for obvious reasons. I needed him safe more than I needed the coin. His army is paid for by his soon-to-be good father and so long as Arianne is queen, he will find that payment enough. With his climb to power taken care of by his uncles and his good-father, at least  _ some  _ of Aegon’s debts will be taken care of by his father. It’s the least Rhaegar could do for him. Giving  _ you  _ your own riches is the least Rhaegar can do for you. From the little I’ve heard of her, your mother was a practical sort. She would not want you to struggle when you did not have to. Now, you have my word, we will all try our utmost to get Ned back. But….if we do not manage it, I will not have you lose out on all that Ned planned for you, all that Rhaegar would have wanted for you...all that she,” Elia paused to look at Lyanna Stark’s statue, “would have wanted for you. It is what I want for you too. Are we clear?” 

Jon stared at her. Lady Stark hated him for less. Ned Stark wouldn’t even mention Jon’s mother’s name. Rhaegar had died with Lyanna’s on his lips. “Why don’t you hate me?” Jon asked. “He did all that to you and you...you have no reason to be kind to me...or even care what comes of me.” Martyn Cassel had been the one to tell him of how they only found him and his mother because of Princess Elia. “I am a threat to your son.”

“Are you, now?” There was mirth in her eyes as she waited for him to answer. When he didn’t she only sighed and said, “Well, that’s a shame.”

“Why do you do anything for me? You could have kept quiet. You could have told Lord Stark I was Rhaegar’s bastard if you wished. You don’t need to tell me of these riches. Why let anyone believe I was trueborn-“

“Even if I stayed silent, those who witnessed your parents’ wedding still live with copies of a letter written in Rhaegar’s hand. Old Shella still holds on to life in Harrenhal. Arthur and Oswell stand beside my son and Richard Lonmouth, wherever he is, also has Rhaegar’s declaration. The truth was always going to come out one day. Rhaegar ensured that. Besides, I have no need to create enmity where it does not exist. I have never wronged someone who doesn’t deserve it before. I will not start now. I have no need to usurp you of your birthright or to hate a child for the deeds of his father.” 

Jon felt an idiot. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I just… Lady Stark always saw me as a threat to her children. Do you truly not see me as the same?”

“Should I?” she asked with a smile. “Do you have a secret desire to be king? Well, let me tell you, being king is not what it seems like in the songs. King’s Landing is a putrid pit of vipers.” 

“But you want Aegon to be king.” 

“I want justice and I want my son to be safe. Claiming his birthright is the only way he will be able to give me justice and be safe. They took seventeen years with my child away from me, Jon. They stole  _ your  _ future too. They must pay for that.” 

Jon voiced a feeling he’d had since he was a child. “When I was little, I wished you were my mother.” 

Elia smiled brightly at him and pulled him toward her and held him there. Jon grimaced and pressed a hand against his ribs. Elia kissed his brow. “Your mother gave birth to a son to be proud of.” 

“How does Aegon feel about all this?” he asked, unsure of this new brother he had.

“Excited. I’ve never seen him smile as much as I did when he came here for Robb’s wedding. Were I not about to expire from fear, I might have truly appreciated what I was seeing. He has always wanted you by his side.” 

Jon himself knew not how to feel about Aegon. He thought him pleasant enough but did not know him enough to have such strong feelings about him. 

“You seem sure Aegon will be king at the end of all this.” 

“It is what I hope for, what I’ve planned and prayed for for the past seventeen years. If all goes well, he will be king. I told you both a story when you were little do you remember?” 

Jon nodded.

“I told you of the gloating lion and the hidden dragons. You have had to live a life that was not befitting of you.”

“I-” Jon said, trying to defend his upbringing.

“Ned did his best, I know,” she affirmed. “It does not mean however, that I was blind of all that went on.” She had a knowing look in her eyes. “While Ned hid you here, Aegon had to hide elsewhere but you will remember, I told you of the long grass that hid both dragons while they grew. The long grass is your seemingly unassuming uncles. Ned for you and Doran for him. Both are fearsome in name but when a man meets either he thinks them too honest, too honourable for deceit. Well,” she laughed, “they think Ned more honourable than Doran but there is some truth in it for him too. Men expect violence from Oberyn but not Doran...after all, he bent the knee to Robert and he allowed them to believe they forced my hand into marriage. But your two uncles taking the actions they did, saved you both, allowed you to grow. Now, I am not so daft to think you will sit back from war against the Lannisters, not with all you know about what they have done to Bran and to Ned. But now you are grown and the time has come from the last two dragons to fight against the man who would see you dead.”

Jon thought on her words. All his life he had been a Snow...he had coveted having a name of his own but in every one of his dreams he was Jon Stark son of Eddard and his sigil was a direwolf.  Who was he now? A dragon, a wolf, nothing at all? Everyone still knew him as Snow. “I am not a dragon,” he muttered. 

Elia only smiled. “You are a dragon by virtue of the blood that flows through your veins.” As if she could read his mind she added, “it does not make you any less of a Stark. Aegon, for all he carries Rhaegar’s name, is still the sun’s son. You do not have to choose, I assure you. Besides,” she added with a laugh, “there is no reason that a wolf could not team up with a dragon to take down the lion. To see the two of you stand side by side would make me happier than you can imagine. For all you are Lyanna’s, you are mine too.” 

They stayed a while longer in the crypts. Jon told her of his decision not to claim his heritage a while longer. Elia called it a smart decision and told him some more of the brother he hardly knew....the son she herself hardly knew. 

By the time they emerged, it was well past lunch. A great silence befell Winterfell as they made their way to The Great Keep. These days, everything in the castle was noise and confusion. Wagons were loaded and unloaded, men arrived everyday, shouts were heard all over and horses were being harnessed and saddled, either being led to or from the stables. Now, eyes and heads were lowered and a stillness prevailed. Elia, on Jon’s arm, looked up at him. But by then the crowd cleared to let them through and he saw the coffin. With all that had been going on, Jon had forgotten that they were expecting this. Ser Rodrik’s presence only confirmed what Jon already knew. 

His brothers...the brothers of his heart stood in front of the coffin. Beside it stood a tall grey-haired man. When he looked towards him, Jon saw sky blue eyes that seemed to turn to ice upon spotting him. Lady Stark was gone but her disdain found a home in her uncle. For that’s who the man was. Whether he wore a cloak in the blue-and-red colours of House Tully or not, Jon would know those hateful eyes anywhere. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Both Stark boys are struggling with their warging. Both think they’re going mad but both are scared of talking about it. Hence Robb trying to explain how he knew something was wrong and giving up before he did. 
> 
> I needed Jon to have that conversation about Lyanna with Martyn Cassel who not only knew Lyanna but also knew Jon was her son. While Elia can tell him about Rhaegar, he could only learn of Lyanna (at least for now) from Martyn. 
> 
> Elia reworked a lot of the truth for Jon but my headcanon, as I said in comments for the reveal chapter, is she’s trying to protect Jon. The poor boy’s world is being ripped apart and she wouldn’t want to burden him further with talk about her feelings about Rhaegar. She’s been more honest with Aegon about his father but Aegon grew up in the full knowledge that everything that befell him, growing up in hiding as he did, was the result of the actions of those before him. He would have to learn from their mistakes if he was to rule. For Jon, she will have to be more careful in what she tells him and when. 
> 
> As for the Blackfish, I love the guy. He’s my second favourite Tully but he’s been left with instructions to look after the interests of Cat’s children and he’s been warned about (wrong) Dornish ambitions… only for Jon to walk in with Elia on his arm.


	39. Robb

**Robb**

A cloud shrouded dawn inched its way across the eastern sky and in the quiet that often accompanies a new dawn before the rising of the birds, Robb Stark stood in vigil over the body of his mother. 

_Body is too soft a word,_ Robb thought. All that was left of his mother were the bones laid out on the trestle table in front of him covered in the blue and red of her ancestral house. Gone was the thick auburn hair that could rival the brilliance of the setting sun, as were the eyes that reminded him of a summer sky, the soft hands that wiped his tears away, and fought an assassin to save Bran’s life. Gone were the lips that held her dazzling smile and the arms that always felt like home. In their place was bones. One set of bones looked like any other. 

Even so, Robb was grateful to have some part of her home. He was grateful for the knowledge that he and his siblings would have somewhere to go to visit their mother. Had she opted for a Tully funeral and not a Stark one, they would have had to send her off in a boat, set it aflame and watch her sail away never to be seen again. There was also the vicious current of the White Knife to think of with its rocky shoots. It didn’t have the serenity of the Red Fork and the Tumblestone which carried Riverrun’s dead off in peace. He wanted his mother to rest in peace. _She_ wanted to rest in her home and he would give her what she instructed through her uncle, Brynden Tully. Yes, he would give her a funeral worthy of the Lady of Winterfell. 

So he found himself here, standing over the last remainders of his mother. The Silent Sisters had seen to her preparation. Septon Chayle stood vigil over her the whole night until Robb dismissed him. As her eldest son, Robb wanted one last quiet moment with her before he had to share his grief with the assembled north. 

He straightened a crease on her grey dress. It was sewn in a northern style and was a symbol of the mantle she wore for seventeen years of her life as wife to the Warden of the North. Robb moved her hands to rest above it across her chest. 

_“I wish you knew,”_ Robb whispered, stroking the silk scarf wrapped across her head. “Father never betrayed you, Mother. He never dishonoured you. He sullied his good name and yours but it was for a good cause. I wish you only had a chance to know that. I believe it would have given you the peace of mind you never had.” Robb couldn’t help but smile. “You were always good at hiding your feelings behind courteous words and silences but some things even you could not hide.”

“I promise you,” he vowed, fixing her scarf. “I will do all I can to be the lord you wished me to become. Though I pray everyday that my father’s duties do not fall to me prematurely. I promise to live by your words too, Mother. I will put family first. I will see to it that Bran and Rickon become the young men you would wish them to be. I will see Sansa and Arya home. I will do _everything_ to bring them home. Father too.” Robb gulped, willing the tears that threatened to break free away. 

He took a hold of the bony hand laid across her chest. “Look out for his visit in the crypts. He will be heartbroken not to be here. It should be him laying you finally to rest, cradling you against his chest one last time but I will bring him home to you, I promise. But if I can’t uphold that vow, I promise to make them all pay starting with the Kingslayer. That is my oath to you, Lady Stark.”

“I will do all I can for Riverrun too. I know how much you missed your home. I gave Uncle Edmure my word. Riverrun will not stand alone.”

In the distance, one wolf’s howl was joined by a chorus of others. Immediately, he found himself snout raised, eyes to the sky crying out in grief. The sun’s fingers pried their way through the clouds. His father was there, quiet and discerning. His black brother’s green eyes barely contained their fury but it was his yellow eyed brother whose grief emanated in painful howls. His white brother moved to him, seeking to offer his comfort. 

Then just like that, Robb was back where he was. His heart crashed against his chest. He found that he increasingly lost control of his person until the boundary between man and wolf disappeared. _I am going mad,_ he thought, rubbing his face. _I am going mad at the worst possible time._

The great oak door groaned. Robb turned his head to see Bran slip in. His brother was already red-eyed but dressed in his best. No longer sporting the wild curls that made he and Rickon look so alike, Bran’s hair was brushed back. He’d put on some weight too since Jon’s return but not enough to bring him back to what he was. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered above the bones that once held their mother’s body and soul. He looked up to Robb, tears trailing now. “It should be me here and her alive, with you all.”

Without a word, Robb crouched down to his ever growing brother until they were eye to eye and gripped his face between his hands. “Never say that again,” he snapped. “Never,” he added more softly. “Mother would never want to hear those words pass your lips.”

“Well, she can’t know,” Bran said bitterly. “She can’t hear anything because she’s dead and if I had died when I should have, none of this would have happened.”

“Yes it would!” Robb shouted. “Do you think Mother would have sat back after they’d killed you? She fought an assassin bare handed knowing that she would die. She would’ve too had Summer not burst in. She didn’t complain once even with her hands ripped to shreds. Mother knelt before the Mother in the sept for a whole night in thanks before she left for King’s Landing. She would have gladly given her life for yours and it would have grieved her to hear you blame yourself. If anyone’s to blame for what befell her, it’s the man that stuck his sword in her gut. Now,” Robb said resolutely, tightening his hold on the back of Bran’s head and parroting words Fathre had said to him more than once. “What are our words?”

Bran wiped his nose. “Winter is coming.” 

Father always called them _‘the hard cruel times.’_ “Winter has come for us Bran,” Robb told his brother. “It visited us when you fell from that tower and then again with the loss of mother, the murder of our men and the arrest of Father. But there is one thing Father always said. Do you remember?” 

“The Starks endure. We always have.” 

“Aye,” Robb confirmed with a smile. “Do you know why?” 

“Because we are pack.” 

“That we are. Now, I won’t lie to you, Bran and tell you we are out of danger. Father is still in the black cells. The Lannisters have the girls and we are about to go to war. Winter _is_ coming. I will have to leave to face it and when I do, I need to know Winterfell is in good hands. I cannot be in two places.” Robb squeezed his brother’s shoulder. “There must _always_ be a Stark in Winterfell. _You_ will have to be that Stark. People will come to you with their petitions, you will have to listen to them and give them succour. You will have to watch over Rickon and protect Wylla. She is one of us now. Can you do that?” 

“Rickon can be the Stark in Winterfell,” Bran protested with the stubbornness he was known for. “I can be your squire. I could even find Arya and Sansa. You have to take me with you. I’d smell where they were and go save them, and when you go to battle Summer and I will fight beside you like Grey Wind and Jon and Ghost.” Bran was speaking as fast as the wind. “Summer and I will tear out the Kingslayer’s throat, and then the war would be over and everyone would come back to Winterfell. You need me out there. The Kingslayer tried to kill me. _I_ have to be the one to find him and I can. Old Nan says I’m a warg. You need me.” 

“Bran…” Robb said cautiously. “Old Nan spins tall tales.” 

“No she doesn’t! Well… she does but she’s right here. I _am_ a warg. I can see through Summer’s eyes. First I dreamt I was Summer but now I can join with Summer at will. Watch,” his brother said at the same moment as a wolf’s howl permeated through the air. Bran looked at Robb again and said. “Wait.” 

“Bran-”

“Wait!” Bran walked over to the window and beckoned him over. “Martyn is leaving Guards Hall,” Bran told him. “In his hands is a red blanket. Ser Rodrik is with him. Jory is wearing a blue cloak today. Not the usual grey.” 

“I don’t see them,” Robb replied, feeling uncomfortable. Wargs were frowned upon, seen as monsters, hunted and feared. They were always evil in Old Nan’s stories too. “You are almost a man grown,” Robb said with annoyance clear in his voice. “Enough of this nonsense. You will not mention this warg nonsense ag-” The rest of his sentence froze in his throat as Martyn appeared walking under the covered bridge in the company of his brother and his son. Just as Bran said, he had a red blanket in his hands. Jory was wearing blue.

Robb opened his mouth and closed it again. 

“See,” his brother said, grinning again. “I told you. You need me.” 

“Bran…” Robb breathed in deeply and exhaled just as long. 

“Rickon is a warg too! Can you see through Grey Wind’s eyes?” 

“Bran…” 

“You can!” Bran’s eyes grew as wide as saucers. “Can Jon? Old Nan says we were meant to have our wolves. We _can_ get the Lannisters. You _have_ to let me come with you!” 

It was the first time Robb had seen his brother return to his animated self since his fall. He turned to face him again. 

“Bran,” Robb said gently, trying to manage his shock. “You cannot tell anyone you are a warg. They won’t understand.” He shook his head. “I need you to remain here. Rickon is only five and you know our brother. He’d use Shaggy and not his words.” 

That managed to elicit a smile from Bran. 

“You have great power, little brother. I need you to watch over our little brother and our people. They will need someone to turn to. You have to be the Stark in Winterfell.” 

It took further coaxing before Bran agreed. Robb promised that he would get him to squire with a great knight. “Ser Barristan or someone better,” Robb said presumptuously. As if he knew any of them as anything more than names in stories. He was just as excited to meet them himself.

“There isn’t anyone better!” 

“You don’t know that.” 

“I do.” 

“I promise you,” Robb said. “If we get Father back, when the war is over. I promise to make the ask.”

“Why would Ser Barristan listen to you?” 

“He wouldn’t but he might listen to Father...Do you trust me?”

Bran nodded at him. 

“Then I promise you, you’ll be a knight one day, just as Father promised but you must take on a knight's duties now and watch over those who need it.” 

They returned to their vigil then, somewhat lightened even though an uncomfortable feeling gnawed at Robb’s gut. Wargs were an abomination. Did that mean they would fail in their quest? The Kings of Winter defeated Gaven Greywolf in the War of the Wolves as well as the Warg King of Sea Dragon Point. Or were the wolves there to watch over them? _Bran’s saved his life and mother’s. Jon was saved more than once by the great grey._

Someone cleared their throat behind them.

“Ser Brynden.”

Ser Brynden Tully, hero of his mother’s stories, smiled kindly at them. “I wanted to be the first here,” he said moresly. “It is my duty to see to her last rites even if she will not be laid to rest according to our traditions.”

“Septon Chayle saw to those,” Robb told him. “All that’s left is the burial now.”

Brynden Tully watched him for a moment before he nodded with a smile. “You are everything she said you were.” The old knight moved to stand next to them. “You, all of you, her children were always in her thoughts on those last days of her life. She wanted more than anything to come home to you. Preferably hale but in anyway she could. I fulfilled one promise by bringing her here.”

Robb thanked him. “You were always in Mother’s stories as well, Ser. She told us often of the uncle who would listen to her troubles and make her laugh. She missed you in the years you spent apart. She was Lady of Winterfell but she was always a daughter of Riverrun in her heart.”

“That she was. Even before she passed, when we thought she was in the clear...she asked me to come here with her so she could give me swords with which to defend Riverrun.”

And just like that, they returned to war. Robb knew the words that were expected of him. “I am honour bound to answer that call, ser. And I will. The north has converged upon Winterfell. Once Lord Karstark arrives with his host we will begin our march south to aid Ser Edmure.” _And to kill the Kingslayer._ “I trust that we can rely upon Riverrun’s swords in our own quest?”

“Riverrun would be honour-bound to answer your call as well,” Brynden Tully affirmed. “After all, the future Lord of Winterfell is a son of ours.”

They fell into a companionable silence then. Bran excused himself. 

“Cat always did her duty,” Brynden Tully told him once he finished his prayers. “Unlike myself,” he added with good humour. “She married your father even though her heart had been set upon your uncle Brandon. Doing her duty to her family, she married a stranger, left her home and gave that once strange man five children, loved him and took his home for hers. Our Little Cat did every duty expected of her honourably.” 

Robb returned his eyes to the bones of his mother. “She did,” he smiled as a lone tear escaped his eye. 

“May I,” Brynden Tully said, moving to the table that held the wine.

“Allow me.” Robb poured him a glass of wine and then himself. He’d need to find some courage somewhere even if could not drink himself silly on this, or any other occasion now. _Winter is coming._

“A Dornish red,” The Blackfish commented, raising his chalice. 

“A gift from Prince Oberyn for my wedding.”

Ser Brynden grunted. “Your mother told me of their influence with your father.”

Jon stepped out into the yard and was walking with Lord Glover. _Are you a warg too?_ Robb wondered. 

Ser Brynden’s eyes fell upon him at the same time. “I hear your father’s bastard is a particular favourite of theirs.”

Robb returned his own eyes to his mother’s uncle. 

“I understand your father means to give him lands.”

“Yes. He would see him named Lord of the New Gift.” 

Ser Brynden took a sip of wine. “I was around your age when I fought behind Lord Ormund Baratheon to bring an end to the last of the Blackfyre pretenders. One man legitimising his bastards unleashed a terror that plagued Westeros for five generations. The talk in Gulltown is of the return of the Last Dragon’s son. The boy is said to have taken Dragonstone with the Golden Company at his back.”

Robb nodded in confirmation. 

“He will make a claim for the throne… I take it he has reached out to you? His mother is here after all.”

“He has.”

“And?”

“My concern is my father’s release and the return of my sisters,” Robb answered tactfully. “Princess Elia is aware of this. I have no interest in the raising or felling of kings.”

“No,” The Blackfish grumbled. “It is your father who does that. Cat was still alive when he resigned instead of hunting down the boy. I come here now to see his mother walk freely among your men-“

“Princess Elia is the wife of a Stark Bannerman.”

“I don’t see the wives of any other bannerman here,” The Blackfish commented wryly. “Even so, you may use it to your benefit. With her son making a claim for the throne...I presume the Lannisters would be willing to give you her weight in gold…”

“I do not want their gold.”

“No, you want your father and sisters back. You have something the Lannisters need more than they need your father. They need allies and they need the upper hand over the Targaryen boy.”

“My father would never allow it.” Robb knew that as surely as he knew his own name. “He would task me with the protection of Princess Elia and I will never betray this trust.” Robb placed his chalice down and stepped closer to The Blackfish. “The Lannisters tried to kill my brother, Ser. They attacked my father in the streets and killed his men. I will have them answer for that. I will not make peace with them by betraying a friend of Winterfell. Besides, they would not return both my sisters and my father to me even if I gave them the princess.” _Not with what my father knows._

“So, you mean to ally yourself with the Targaryen boy?”

“I mean,” Rob grinded out, “to bury my mother. Then, seeing as Aunt Lysa refuses to join us,” he spat bitterly, “I mean to fulfill my pledge to Uncle Edmure.” 

The Lady of the Eyrie had sent her sister’s body home with an honour guard who left for The Vale the day after. Apparently Lysa Arryn required _all_ her swords around her son. _Right after throwing my family in peril,_ he remembered thinking bitterly when Ser Cortnay Penrose told him of Lysa’s words. Lysa Arryn had written to his parents telling them, according to Maester Luwin, that the Lannisters had killed her husband. Yet now, when the time came to fight against them on behalf of her husband and her father, she withheld her swords. 

“Then,” he said, stepping even closer, “I mean to free my father and make the Lannisters pay for what they did to my family.”

“Honourable intents,” Ser Brynden commented in a brittle tone. “Rhaegar was no Aerys. I will give him that. Mayhaps his son will be as good a king as Jaehearys himself...I hear he was raised by Ashara Dayne. I ask you this, what would a boy do for the woman who raised him?”

Robb could only stare incredulously at his mother’s uncle unsure of where the conversation was going. 

Brynden Tully returned his eyes to the yard below where Jon stood talking to Lord Glover and the Greatjon. “I told you what one king’s word legitimising bastards did to the realm. Your mother was raised on the stories of those wars. As you know, both Hoster and I fought in the last of them. She knew that a kingdom could not look to two different men. Your father, it seems, never understood that.”

“Speak plainly, ser,” Robb demanded impatiently. 

“I mean to say, the Dornish look after their interests well. For seventeen years they’ve presented the face of a cowed beast to the world. In that time, according to your mother, they’ve made themselves indispensable to the north. I’ve seen for myself how Dornish traders litter White Harbor’s shores. I understand you expect Doran’s heir here any day now. Elia Martell sits among your lords as if she was one herself and she has seen to it that the Dornish bastard does as well. What’s to say her son will not name Ashara Dayne’s bastard Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North?”

“Who?” Robb asked, confused. 

“It is in Dornish interests to see your father’s Dornish bastard rule the north.”

“Jon?”

“Aye. Seeing as his mother raised the Targaryen boy. It would be handsome enough a reward to raise her son high. Your father seems to have paved the way with this lordship business.” Brynden Tully scowled at Jon in the yard below. 

Laughter burst itself out of Robb’s chest at the incredulity of it all. 

“I have watched him these past two days,” Brynden Tully went on. “He knows the lordlings, their squires and free riders by name and speaks to your lords as if _he_ were Winterfell.”

“Well, I would hope so,” Robb laughed. “...seeing as he and I are both sons of Winterfell.”

“Look, boy,” Brynden Tully said unimpressed. “Your mother’s last words were to warn me against the Dornish ambitions up here. She made me promise to protect your rights as she would have. They have proven themselves to be vipers who strike when you least expect-“

“Ser Brynden,” Robb said in a voice like iron. “You are mistaken. As was my mother. I do not know who Ashara Dayne is, but I assure you, she is not Jon’s mother. Nor is there a secret Dornish plot to place him in my father’s seat. Jon _is_ my brother.” _Regardless of who his father is._

Jon and he had been inseparable since they were children. Best friends and rivals at times, brothers always. “His only concern, is the same as mine. We will take these men south, bring my father and sisters home, and make the Lannisters pay for their crimes. All I ask of you is not to concern yourself with matters beyond your ken. It is neither becoming of you nor is it your place to speak of-”

The Blackfish scowled. “Your mother boy-“

“My mother,” Robb said, looking over at where what was left of her lay, “was mistaken...greatly mistaken. I regret that she did not live to realise just how much. I would thank you to let those mistaken beliefs lie with her.”

They buried her as she wished in Winterfell’s crypts. Her casket was carried by her two older sons, her uncle and the three Cassel men of Winterfell in front of a quiet north permeated only by the howling of wolves.

Once in the crypts, Rickon tried to climb into the tomb with her. Robb’s knees turned to water many times. Each time it was Jon who held him up. It was Jon who managed to calm Rickon down when he bit The Blackfish who pulled him out of the tomb and it was Jon who comforted Bran.

They laid Mother to rest in the tomb opposite Lyanna Stark’s. The irony of it was not lost on Robb as he stood under the statue of the aunt he never knew to watch his mother placed in her final resting place. 

The ghost that haunted his parents’ marriage was no one but the sister who left his father with a trust he never betrayed. _Not even to the woman who became part of his soul._

Now it fell to Robb to protect that trust and all that came with it. That included those who upheld that trust, those his father _had_ committed treason to protect. He instructed Jory to see to it that Princess Elia was well guarded. His mother’s uncle The Blackfish may be, but Robb didn’t know him enough to trust he would not act upon his misguided words.

They’d just left the crypts when the arrival of Princess Arianne Martell was heralded by the guards. Though he was tired of the game of thrones, and talk of war, Robb found himself standing in Winterfell’s courtyard to welcome the Dornish emissary as she rode in. In her company was her brother Prince Trystane Martell, and a girl who could only be Lady Shireen Baratheon given the banner of the prancing stag that accompanied her. Among their company was a large white-cloaked knight. 

“How in seven hells is _he_ still alive?” Ser Brynden Tully muttered beside Robb. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We don’t have a Robb POV in the books so I have no idea how he feels about warging but I find it so hilarious how Jon is creeped out about it at first while Arya and Bran not only accept they’re wolves but revel in it. Rickon was happy long before that to bite those he doesn’t like just like his wolf. In the words of Bran, the younger Starks are all, “awoooooo.” Seeing as he spends all day with Old Nan, the local lore encyclopaedia, I’m presuming Bran would be the first to know they’re wargs. 
> 
> Ser Brynden is trying to look out for his nephlings but darn those stubborn Starks lmao.
> 
> Ashara’s minding her business in Dragonstone and being dragged in Winterfell. Poor lady.
> 
> I’m fully aware there’s not been enough Robb/Wylla but Robb’s chapters seem to focus on one main scene so far. Wylla Manderly is amazing and deserves all the love.  
> I’m not sure why Cat was insistent on being laid to rest in Winterfell. Maybe she wanted her children to be able to visit her or maybe she wanted to haunt the castle in case Jon became Lord. 
> 
> I know, every chapter seems to end with a new arrival. Sorry! I’m getting cliche. Anyway, I feel sorry for team Winterfell. Every time they feel as if they have things under control something new pops up. We leave Winterfell after the next chapter. I just need to figure out what it’s main beats are.


	40. Arianne

**Arianne**

Arianne Martell had been many things in her life. Once, she was a pudgy girl who thought of herself as too undesirable to dream of a good match. She had been a devoted daughter and then a usurped princess. She had taken her father for an enemy and then became his trusted servant. She had been raised to be queen - even when she saw her father’s insistence upon her education as a burden. But she hadn’t _felt_ like one upon that path until this moment. She hadn’t felt like a woman destined to be queen when she sailed at the head of an armada, nor did she feel one when Aegon took Dragonstone. It took him sending her to speak with his voice and his authority for her to feel the queen her father raised her to be. Arianne Martell was a king’s betrothed and emissary and she _would_ do a queen’s duty to tie the Starks to his cause. 

The north was roused, that much was clear. White Harbor’s defences had been strengthened and repaired since her last visit here mere months ago. _Ned Stark’s instructions_ , she knew. From her three nights in New Castle she saw knights descending upon White Harbor and readying themselves for the long march south. Each day new vassals and their retainers descended upon the castle. This, she heard, was the picture all along this kingdom. 

‘ _Watch, learn what you can and charm them all,’_ her uncle had instructed her. So she shopped in the markets with Wynafryd, gave generous alms to orphanages and soup kitchens and visited friends her uncle had made in the city. 

‘ _One can do more with soft words and softer laughs,’_ Oberyn Martell had said upon their parting. It appeared that wisdom was not lost upon the Lord of New Castle himself. Wyman Manderly, four-chinned, jovial in nature and calculating, prodded and pricked them all with unassuming questions hid behind a booming laugh and jolly conversation. ‘ _The man plays a craven and a fool,’_ Oberyn Martell told her. _‘He plays many a man for a fool with that act.’_

He and his sons feasted them every night in the Merman’s Court with fresh eel, capons, eggs made in a hundred different ways, pork pies and sausage and even, to her surprise, Dornish sweets and spiced meats. 

“Sunspear has been a true, if unlikely, friend of White Harbor’s,” he told her when she shared her surprise at the Dornish spread put before her one night. “As have the tradesmen of Great Norvos, princess. It is my honour to host you and to toast,” he added raising his glass - he served a Dornish red with every meal- “the marriage of our dear friend’s son. Just how, may I ask, did this marriage come to be?” 

Arianne raised her glass to her lips to give her a moment to think.

“We have heard rumours of course… of a Targaryen fleet, the return of the dragons, black _and_ red as well as...the death of certain lords. It would do us well to hear matters as they stand from one who might know truth from falsehood.” 

He watched her with shrewd eyes while she told him of the events at Dragonstone keen to highlight Stannis’ death _before_ their arrival. “Our king felt a duty to Lady Shireen,” Arianne said tactfully, putting a hand on the girl’s arm. “The Lannisters are no friends of hers and we are not the kind to leave innocents at the mercy of oppressors.” 

Wyman Manderly nodded. “How noble,” he commented wryly. “Please,” he said looking around to the servants standing near the walls, “I think it’s time for the pie!” 

Arianne had expected his next questions to be about Aegon. Instead, he turned his attention to her companion Ser Gerold Hightower when an old one-legged knight hobbled in apologising for his tardiness. Something about the timing of the man’s arrival and the twinkle in the Manderly lord’s eyes told Arianne the arrival was planned. 

With Ser Oswell critical to Aegon’s intentions in the south, and Ser Arthur the head of the now _royal_ army, it fell to the Lord Commander of Aegon’s Kingsguard to accompany her north to offer his unrivalled battle-mind to the Stark cause as a sign of good faith. 

‘ _And a reminder that we will either float together or sink together,”_ her uncle added. ‘ _Ned Stark’s secrets are bound up with ours. Let them see their great lord was central to our cause.’_

“Ser Bartimus here saved my life at The Trident,” Lord Manderly offered ceremoniously when the man sat down. “It was a long battle, tough. I was not what I am now then of course. I was a good enough horse-man, not too terrible at the jousting either. I’d won some small acclaim on the lists as a boy. That doesn’t prepare you for battle however. I was no match for many on that battlefield. I saw them all at The Trident, you see. I saw your uncle Robert in his monstrous armour, sweet girl,” he smiled at Shireen. “I saw our valiant Ned fight where the battle was thickest. I saw the Last Dragon himself, an unrivalled swordsman until the end...it was a hammer that took him after all.” He paused to look at Ser Gerold Hightower as he took a sip. “I saw Ser Barristan Selmy cut through men like a hot knife through butter. Your own uncle Lewyn was an army in himself. As for Jonothor Darry, well, the man _was_ the one who injured me! There were three men absent however,” he said in a lower voice, “three men whose names and legends travelled even up here.” 

The White Bull looked at the Lamprey Lord unblinkly. He reminded Arianne of her father’s man - her mother’s really - Areo Hotah, the captain of their household guard. He and Ser Gerold, the White Bull, were mountains of men who spoke few words, had true hearts, and placed duty above all. 

“We heard much later that you had perished in Dorne.” Another silence. “Yet here you are sitting across from me. _How curious!”_

“One should not always believe what they hear,” Ser Gerold replied in the same tone. “After all, here I am, sitting across from you.” 

“Aye,” the northern lord smiled. “Just how did that come to be?” 

“They were in Dorne,” Arianne chimed in, “Surrounded by friends.” She smiled again. “Is it such a surprise that there were those who would see to it that their king’s men survived?” 

“So Ser Gerold is not only our only ghost returned to the realm of the living?” 

“There seem to be plenty of those, my lord.” 

Lord Manderly grinned wider. “Oh, aye. Just how did a boy thought dead survive?”

“Loyal servants are few and far between, my lord, but they do exist.”

“Ah, loyalty. Now that is something I know about. You’ve seen the Wolf’s Den, yes? It reminds me everyday of the oath my own ancestors swore to House Stark. I know just how far one would go for the one to whom they owe their loyalty. Well,” he drawled between one mouthful and another. “I am relieved to hear Princess Elia’s boy lives.” He tucked into his pie. “Does her daughter also?”

“No, my lord. The Lannisters saw to that.”

“A real shame. My Wylis here told me of Ned’s fury when that happened. My brave boy raced ahead for King’s Landing after The Trident,” he boasted about a man old enough to be Arianne’s father. Ser Wylis Manderly, father to Wynafryd and Wylla and heir to New Castle had a thick moustache that made him resemble a walrus and was only a trifle slimmer than his father. Underneath all the lard however as an affable, generous man, and according to her uncle, a fiercely loyal one. 

“Aye, I met your father when we lifted the siege at Storm’s End, my lady,” Ser Wylis said to Shireen. “And Princess Elia earlier than that. Our Ned had publicly disparaged the king for the injustice done to the princess. Still, I am heartened to hear that at least one of the princess’ children survived. I cannot even imagine the pain she must have suffered.” He smiled sadly not at them, but at his wife, Lady Leona, whose hand he held over the table. 

“Now history once again plays out before our eyes,” Lord Manderly mused, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “Once again, Baratheon locks horns with Targaryen and the realm will bleed all the same.”

“Lannister locks horns with Stark, Tully, _and_ Targaryen,” Arianne corrected, returning his smile. “The bastard boy in King’s Landing is no Baratheon. Shireen here is the last of her house.” 

The heavy shelf of Lord Manderly’s face lifted. Six scandalised Manderly faces and one shocked one-eyed knight listened with rapt attention as Arianne told them of Cersei’s incestuous affair with her brother, of her orders to see Renly and Loras Tyrell dead for what they knew - though Loras survived - her attack on the Stark household and her attempt to silence Ned Stark because of what _he_ knew. 

Shireen filled in the gaps detailing her own father’s flight to Dragonstone and of the army he was building around himself. The girl was painfully shy owing to the scars she sported on her face, but beneath the shyness, Arianne learnt, was a calculating wit and desire to see herself survive. Aegon was her best bet. Taking them as allies rather than as enemies was best for her own needs - safety, security, survival. That influence came with those things was only an added benefit. 

She’d married Trystane in a hastily arranged wedding conducted two nights before they left Dragonstone. Her mother, as expected, was opposed to the entire scheme. The Baratheon men left in the castle, however, were hers and not her mother’s. As was her father’s man Davos Seaworth, who not only gave her away at the wedding but insisted on two of his sons travelling north with her as part of her new household. 

While she was no substitute for Tyene who stayed in Dragonstone to await her father’s return, nor Nymeria who travelled to King’s Landing with Uncle Oberyn, or any of her cousins, truth be told, Arianne liked the company of her new good-sister. Sure, it took coaxing to get her to come out of her shell but Arianne remembered being painfully shy and doubtful of her own self once. “You are a Martell now, in all the ways that matter,” Arianne told her. _Even if your marriage is still unconsummated_ . She brushed the girls hair away from her face and made her look in the mirror. ‘ _A scar on your body does not define you. Unbent, unbowed, unbroken. Let those words define you instead. You will not be cowed ever again.”_

Knowing there was more to their trip than met the eye, Wyman Manderly insisted on joining them on their trip to Winterfell. “Your aunt, uncle and father are great friends of White Harbor,” he explained. “It would not do to send you to Winterfell without an honour guard.” Friendship often meant influence in court and those words sounded like music to Arianne’s ears. That he insisted that he was only doing the duty of an old friend to her house told Arianne the Manderly lord saw the tide turning and would get ahead of it for the betterment of his family. After all, White Harbor had been most enriched from the trade her father and his siblings had brought north. 

“Besides,” he continued, “I have missed my granddaughter.” _My granddaughter is to be Lady of Winterfell,_ he meant of course. _I will learn of whatever you have to say to Robb Stark through her._

So had Arianne Martell found herself riding ahead of the Manderly lord who was being lugged upon his litter. Even Shireen, it seemed, had tired of the pace Lord Manderly had set and rode ahead with her. 

Winterfell was still in mourning, though Winter Town itself was rammed with even more people than were present for Robb’s wedding. She looked around even before she disembarked from her horse for her aunt and Lord Glover, neither of whom was in the courtyard. Robb Stark stood in the middle, looking as if he’d aged years since she last saw him. Jon fared a little better but even he had a weary look in his eyes. The youngest Starks were there too. The youngest’s wolf had grown to be larger than him but it was Bran Arianne was most pleased to see. The boy had been all but declared an invalid when she last saw him, yet here he was. 

Her brother muttered, “They’re larger than you said!” 

“They grew.” She rolled her eyes to which Trystane made a face. Before she knew it, Arianne was sticking her tongue out at her brother. _A wonderful start,_ she thought. _How queenly._ If they saw her, the Stark boys did not react. Wylla Manderly stood there with them as well, green-haired and regal. She smiled kindly at Arianne. She’d gotten to know the Manderly sisters over the years since they always docked at White Harbor when they came north. 

Beside the Starks stood a serious-looking man, one she’d never seen before. Taller than Robb and Jon, he was old but strong in look. Blue-eyed, grey haired and wearing a clasp in the form of a black trout. _The Blackfish,_ she surmised. 

“Brynden Tully,” Ser Gerold offered at the same time as he helped her off her horse. 

“You know him?” 

“We fought together in the Stepstones.” 

Arianne knew what was expected of her. She shared her condolences, spoke of her sympathies and of her fond memories of Lady Stark. If truth were told they were fond memories of the few times she stopped in the castle and less about the late Catelyn Stark herself but she had to start somewhere. Robb accepted her condolences graciously. From there she moved to greet Wylla Manderly. Then came Jon. 

Jon Snow... _Targaryen,_ regarded her strangely but was polite in his greeting too. His aloofness told Arianne all she needed to know so she whispered in his ear, “Hello cousin.” The dragon in her blood was negligible but she had always enjoyed ruffling the boy’s feathers. He cleared his throat in discomfort and it made her smile somewhat. Laugh she could not. It was a funeral after all. 

She ruffled Rickon’s hair in greeting. He slapped her hand away and was about to run off when Jon placed a hand on his shoulder to still him. Bran was more receptive but his eyes remained square on Ser Gerold. Arianne smiled. Anyone who had ever met Brandon Stark knew he was obsessed with knighthood. Ser Gerold’s own eyes were upon his prince’s son.

“Allow me to introduce my companions,” she announced loudly. “My brother Trystane has never had the opportunity to visit Winterfell but has heard so much about you.” 

“As have we. Welcome,” Robb replied. 

“This is my good-sister, Lady Shireen Baratheon, the rightful Lady of Storm’s End.” 

Jon and Robb exchanged an almost imperceptible glance before the Stark heir extended a warm greeting to the girl. 

Brynden Tully eyed them carefully but said nothing. He was yet to be formally introduced after all. When he was, Arianne finished off this exchange of introductions with, “Last but certainly not least, allow me to introduce you to a man who needs no introduction, the Lord Commander of the Rightful King of Westeros’ Kingsguard, Ser Gerold Hightower.” 

“I heard you were dead,” the Blackfish made known. 

“As you can see, I am not,” Ser Gerold gibed. 

The Blackfish stared for a moment before he burst out into laughter. “I haven’t seen you since...gods, Harrenhal.” 

“Twenty years, old friend.” 

“Oh, but it is good to see you!” They grasped hands and embraced. “What brings you here?” the Blackfish asked after. 

Robb Stark cleared his throat then. “Ser Gerold,” he broke in, extending out a hand “On behalf of my lord father, I welcome you to Winterfell.” He turned to Arianne then, “You must be tired, princess, please,” he motioned towards the Great Keep. “Follow me.” _Not the Guest House,_ she noted. 

Arianne gestured for Drey, the Seaworth boys and her own lady-in-waiting Jayne Ladybright who had sailed from Dragonstone with her to follow. “I thank you...before we rest, however,” Arianne made known, “I would request an audience with you first. There are things we must discuss.”

Robb nodded sternly and led the way. Whatever he said to his uncle, Brynden Tully did not follow them. Bran did, however. “Is that _really_ Ser Gerold Hightower?” he whispered. “The White Bull,” he added to ensure there was no confusion about who exactly he meant. 

She found herself laughing. “Yes, it is.” 

The boy grinned. As tired as he looked - Bran Stark was a shadow of the boy who had welcomed them last time round - the smile became him. “But Father fought him in Dorne. He is dead.” 

“Well,” Arianne whispered, “The fact that he is walking in front of us tells me he’s still alive.” 

“Do you think I’m allowed to speak to him?” 

“Why wouldn’t you? I’ve already told him all about your dreams of knighthood. He’s keen to see what you know but you should start with Trystane first, he’s closer to your age and could do with a friend.” 

The smile he returned was almost blinding. 

Robb Stark closed the door to the solar and informed her that he had sent for the princess. Stark men shuffled in. The Cassels came in first. All three of them. Then came the maester who took a seat beside Jon. He was followed by the bushy bearded Lord Wull who Arianne had met at the wedding. The Cassels were the Starks’ most trusted men, a maester often knew all his lord’s secrets, and Theo Wull had been at the Tower of Joy with Ned Stark. Her aunt and her husband arrived last. Elia’s embrace made Arianne feel less nervous. Her aunt would be beside her. 

“Lord Glover,” Arianne said as she curtsied to her aunt’s husband. “It is good to see you again.” 

“Hmm,” Ethan Glover grunted. 

He responded more warmly to Trystane’s “Uncle!” and hug. 

“Aunt Elia... _Uncle_ Ethan. Allow me to introduce the latest addition to our family, the Lady Shireen Baratheon, Trystane’s bride.” 

Her aunt smiled warmly at Shireen, held her face in her hands and kissed her brow. “Welcome to the family,” Elia said. “I knew your father. I am sorry to hear of his death.”

Whatever Shireen Baratheon was, she knew her courtesies well and accepted Elia’s sympathy graciously. 

“Shireen,” Arianne tried again, “this is my uncle, Lord Ethan Glover.” 

Shireen curtsied. 

“I am sorry to hear of your father’s death,” he said to her. “Tell me, my lady, how did he come to pass? And remember,” he added pointedly, “to tell it true, you are among friends now.” 

Her aunt grit her teeth and moved away from his side. It was clear their relation had suffered as a result of Aegon’s conquest. With her own parents’ less than warm relation, and her uncle’s less than conventional relationship with Ellaria, Arianne had thought her aunt’s marriage was the picture of what a marriage should look like. 

“My lady, have you been harmed in any way?” he queried.

Shireen shook her head and in her quiet voice spoke of her father’s flight from King’s Landing, his untimely death at the hands of a rabid dog that had escaped the kennels and assured Lord Glover that she had been treated well since the fall of Dragonstone. 

“His Grace has taken me into his family, granted me a place of honour in his court, and promised to return to me the birthright that has been usurped from me by Cersei Lannister and her children.” Then to Arianne’s shock, she looked not down upon the floor but right into Lord Glover’s eyes and said, “I would say it is a great deal better than what I should expect of my uncle’s wife, my lord. Given what she did to my uncle Renly, all I am to expect from Cersei Lannister is a cold knife between the ribs.” 

Robb spoke next. “My lady, as the last of your house, some would say you are the rightful heir to the Iron Throne. Why support Prince Aegon’s claim when you could make a claim of your own?” 

Shireen smiled at him and if Arianne’s brows rose any higher they might have disappeared into her hairline. 

Elia watched her carefully awaiting her answer. 

“Perhaps some kingdoms would side with me,” she concurred. “Others might split, the Stormlands chief among them. Cersei has her younger son to offer to an ambitious lord to entice an alliance after all. Dorne is Aegon’s. On one hand, House Tyrell might choose Renly's niece because they will never forgive Cersei for what befell Ser Loras. They might choose Aegon for the same reason. He has his own armies after all. Of course, there is the fact that House Tyrell's hands are tied for as long as Cersei keeps him alive to consider. Who does that leave me?”

“Those that sided with your father the first time.”

“I am not my uncle, Lord Glover, nor yet my father. I am a girl of five-and-ten and I have no desire to send thousands to their death on my behalf.”

That seemed to shut the northerners up. The door fell open then. “I thought you might need some refreshment,” Wylla Manderly said, guiding servants in with trays of teas and tarts. 

“I am sorry I am late,” Lord Manderly boomed from behind her. “Yes,” he said over his shoulder pointing to a place next to the window. “Just there will do.” 

The man had brought with him his own custom made seat made with his girth in mind. 

“My lord, we-” Robb began.

“No need to explain yourself to your own grandfather,” the Manderly lord panted, waving a hand dismissively as he took his seat. “It is quite alright, my boy. Stark and Manderly are one after all. Please continue and accept my sincere apologies for my tardiness. A litter moves slower than one horseback. It’s quite alright though, the princess has apprised me of matters already.” 

“She has?” 

“Oh aye. Thank you, my dear,” he said to Wylla who handed him a cup of tea. When she left, he turned his attention back to Robb. “I’ve heard all about the queen, the Kingslayer and their bastards. As I said, please don’t mind me.” He bit into a blackberry tart. “I only mean to know how I can be of use.”

“My lord,” Robb began. 

“No, no,” he said, mouth full and gulping. “Really, you have no need to explain yourself. I came the moment I could. What is an elder for if not to offer you advice? But,” he commented, looking around the room, “You know that better than me...you’ve surrounded yourself with your elders after all. Your dear grandfather is only sorry not to have come to you quicker.” 

“My lord, we are speaking of a delicate matter.” 

“Shame on you, Robb. Would you keep secrets already known by... _friends_ from your own family?”

 _Yes,_ Arianne thought, _if one is a Stark or Martell._

Arianne moved to pour herself a cup of tea. 

“We had not intended to make news of the Lannister’s incest public,” Robb Stark divulged, ignoring Lord Manderly. The Starks had apparently intended to keep the news secret in the hope that it may help them get Lord Stark back. Bran, it turned out, had seen the Kingslayer and Cersei in the tower from which he fell. Arianne could have squealed in delight at the news. Not at the attempt on the poor boy's life but in what he knew. There was a witness to their claims! The Spider _was_ a witness but his word could be doubted. After all, he’d bent the knee to a king he betrayed for his entire reign. The Spider’s evidence was shaky too. Apparently it was some book about lineages and hair colours that Arianne hadn’t fully understood. Brandon Stark of Winterfell was a whole different kettle of fish. The Starks would not forgive that so easily. 

Lord Manderly clutched the crystal across his neck harder and cursed the Lannisters loudly. 

_Good,_ Arianne thought. _Now if only every northern lord would react like this my job here would be a thousand-fold easier._

“ _You_ haven’t made it known, Robb,” she assured him as she sat back in her seat. “ _We_ have. In any case, it’s the worst kept secret in the Red Keep. Cersei Lannister’s focus now is to keep your father alive long enough to convince him to declare the legitimacy of her children against the slanderous attacks of a would-be usurper.” She allowed herself a moment to smile. “She’s created quite the mess for herself, you see. She’s earned herself the enmity of House Tyrell who is already aware of her dark secret. Her father is occupied in the Riverlands, you are raising an army here and Aegon is on her doorstep. She is in need of allies. If she can convince your father-”

“She can’t.” 

“What matters is that she has hope. Otherwise she would have killed him along with his men.”

“Have you had word from Highgarden?” Aunt Elia asked her. 

Arianne looked at Ser Gerold. “I have written to my niece and Lord Tyrell,” he answered. “To express my sympathies and to announce the return of His Grace.”

“We were yet to hear from them when we left.”

“What do you know of what happened to _Father?”_ Jon asked, stressing the last word.

“Well,” Arianne began, “I know he was betrayed by a man who presented himself as a friend.”

“Who?”

Arianne related all she’d heard from Ser Aron Santagar about Petyr Baelish. 

Of Ser Aron, “a true man,” Ser Rodrik said. Of Lord Petyr Baelish Ser Rodrik Cassel informed them that the man had been the one to send Lady Stark after The Imp. He had also promised to help Lord Stark find out who killed Jon Arryn. 

Lord Wyman Manderly’s calculating eyes widened the more he came to learn about just what had been kept hidden from him. 

“What reason would he have for betraying my father?” Robb asked. 

“My uncle thought the decision was likely not out of hatred of your father but of Lord Stannis.”

She went on to tell them of the massacre of the Stark household in the throne room and of the Stark men killed in the stables as they got ready to leave King’s Landing. “Sansa was already being held in Maegor’s Holdfast while all this happened-“

“What of Arya?” Jon leaned forward, eyes imploring. 

“We’ve had no news of her,” her aunt explained.

“Neither have we,” Arianne faltered. “Arya…seems to have disappeared.”

“What do you mean disappeared?” Jon hissed at her. “How does someone _disappear?”_ His face was flushed, his breathing harried, and his eyes desperate, clearly fearing the worst. 

“We had the same questions,” she declared earnestly. “All anyone knows is that Arya was at her dancing lesson when Lannister men came looking for her. Her dancing master held them off long enough for her to flee. The man died in the pursuit but Arya was never found. Our men are searching for her,” she quickly added. “If...she’s alive…” Arianne could have sworn she saw the light die in the dark eyes that looked beseechingly at her a moment before. He sank into his seat. “My uncle will find her,” she finished. 

Robb Stark had his face in his hands. Jon seemed to smolder with irritation. In the distance Arianne heard angry barks. 

“Uncle Oberyn sailed for King’s Landing when we got the news,” she made sure to tell them. “We owe him a debt for what he did for Aunt Elia. Aegon’s promise to you is that he will return Lord Stark to you safely. Sansa...and Arya too, wherever she is.”

“Just how will he do that?” Lord Manderly’s eyes were sharp. 

“Dorne still has friends in the Red Keep, my lord.” 

“They killed her,” she heard Jon mutter. “They killed her.” 

“Ser Aron was sure her body was not among the dead. Perhaps she has found succour outside the walls of the castle. What did they call her here? Yes, Underfoot. Perhaps she is alive. Perhaps Uncle Oberyn has already found her.” Arianne tried reaching out to him but he shrugged her off. She was losing them she realised. Both boys had lost interest in what she had to say. 

“The Lannisters have wronged us all,” she tried. “They killed my cousin Rhaenys and tried to do the same to my aunt. They attacked Lord Stark in the streets and ambushed him in the throne room. They’ve killed your men and attempted to kill your brother. They’ve usurped Shireen of her rights. King Aegon wishes to-“

“King? He referred to himself as Prince in his letter to me.” 

_Damn him and his insistence to be crowned before he claimed the title_ , Arianne thought. “The truth remains that Aegon _is_ the rightful king,” she said, aiming for a casual tone. “I come as an emissary of his to extend a hand of friendship and of kin-“

Robb Stark coughed loudly and her aunt pinched her thigh. _That_ was clearly still a secret. It was one Aegon had hoped to finally bring out into the open as a show that Targaryen and Stark were linked by blood. 

“Aegon offers you what no one will,” she said frankly. “He will return to you your father, he will give you justice against the Lannisters and will stand beside you in the Riverlands.”

Robb told her he could not bend the knee to Aegon, not while his father was hostage. 

That was fine. She knew that it was Ned Stark who would be kingmaker. “All Aegon asks in return is your friendship,” she assured him. 

That seemed to have regained their attention. She restrained the urge to grin. “As a sign of his good faith, Aegon has sent you the Lord Commander of his Kingsguard to aid you in your campaign against the Lannisters. No man alive has fought and won more battles than him. Tywin Lannister himself was still only a squire when Ser Gerold was named Lord Commander of the Kingsguard.”

Ser Gerold took over then to update them first on the picture in the south and then on Aegon’s efforts to unite the scattered riverlords who were once loyal to his father.

He told them of the Lannister host advancing upon the Riverlands and the unlikelihood of Ser Edmure being able to hold them back. The Lannisters had raised 35,000 men split into two hosts - one led by the Old Lion himself who was already in the Riverlands, and the second led by his kingslaying son who was embarking upon the Golden Tooth. If he got past it, Riverrun was directly upon his path. 

Tywin Lannister, on the other hand, having failed in his aim to ambush Ned Stark in the Riverlands had fought a battle against the men Lord Stark sent ahead at the Red Fork. 

“He will have heard by now that you are amassing a host. You are young and untested. He will want to catch you along your march, long before you reach Riverrun. His earliest opportunity to do so is here.” Ser Gerold pointed out a spot along the Green Fork on the map unfurled across the desk. “With the Kingslayer focusing his attention on Riverrun and Tywin Lannister likely to settle his armies here waiting for you,” he circled a finger in an area where the river road met the kings road and the high road just north of The Trident. “His Grace will cut Tywin off from his son by taking Harrenhal.”

Ser Oswell Whent had already begun reaching out to the riverlords who remained loyal to House Targaryen. Principal among them was his cousin and good sister, the Lady Shella of Harrenhal, one of the few witnesses to Rhaegar’s second wedding. Ser Oswell was sure that she would welcome the extra men to hold her castle. They were sure that the Darrys of Castle Darry would join their cause without question as well. Ser Jonothor had died with Rhaegar and Ser Willem Darry had died in exile with Aegon and his late cousin. 

The Mootons of Maidenpool had never forgotten the death of their brother Myles at the hands of Robert Baratheon and would welcome their prince’s son and his offer of aid with open arms. 

It was clear to Arianne that while the Tullys were the overlords of the Riverlands, each riverlord acted upon their own interests. 

“Take Harrenhal, and His Grace will be well-positioned to march south to King’s Landing if the need arises. With Maidenpool ours, he will have a base from which to get reinforcements by sea as well. If Jaime Lannister marches north to relieve his father,” Ser Gerold moved a finger across the map. “His Grace’s host will be able to march west to relieve Riverrun. The castle is also large enough to host His Grace’s host-“

 _And those damned elephants_ , Arianne added in her mind. 

“With your attack from the north and His Grace’s attack from the south, our united forces will have Tywin Lannister surrounded and on the backfoot.”

“Our king means to finish the work Lord Stark started in the Riverlands,” Arianne chimed in sweetly. The northerners were listening eagerly to Ser Gerold. “Aegon will not suffer his people being crushed under the yoke of Lannister oppression.”

Finally alone, Arianne and Ser Gerold recalled in great detail Aegon’s taking of Dragonstone and updated her aunt with news of what Doran Martell was doing in Dorne, Oberyn’s plans for Ned Stark, and how Trystane’s marriage to Shireen came around. Elia paced around the room, listening silently. Now and again she’d share a comment, the first being, ‘ _Damn them both,’_ about her brothers. She asked them questions too and told them of how things had been for her in the north. Her marriage was in tatters. “There’s nothing to do for it,” she said moresly. She also told of the men of the Vale who came to return Catelyn Stark’s body. Among them she said was Lyn Corbray, the man who’d killed Uncle Lewyn. It was war Arianne told herself and they had lost but it didn’t stop the sharp lash of heat that burnt in her heart when she thought of the man who killed the uncle who used to tickle her breathless as a child. As fond as her own memories were, she knew her aunt would feel his loss even more keenly. Uncle Lewyn had after all been her greatest champion and companion when she became bride to Prince Rhaegar. He had been Ser Gerold’s brother too but there was honour in dying in battle. On the list of people that had wronged them, Lyn Corbray hardly featured. He had, after all, taken up the mantle after his own father was injured by Uncle Lewyn.

More interestingly however was the fact that Lysa Arryn had outright refused to have her men join the fray. _Her father is surrounded,_ Arianne reflected. _She would leave him to be slaughtered._

Elia also disclosed why the Starks had decided to keep Jon’s parentage secret for longer hence the exchange earlier in the Stark solar. 

“Aegon had hoped to have this news shared sooner rather than later, aunt. Uncle Oberyn too. I told Lord Manderly Ser Gerold was saved by Dornish friends but didn’t expound on it. People will have questions.” 

“Aegon will have to wait,” her aunt said. “The north will listen to the words of Ned Stark’s bastard before they ever follow Rhaegar’s son. It serves us to have Jon in a position of influence. As for Ser Gerold, we will think of something.” 

Elia Martell’s composure finally broke when Arianne gave her Aegon’s letter. She gasped, covered her mouth and choked out a sound that lay somewhere between a sob and laughter. 

“Oh Arianne,” she whimpered, looked up and laughed. “My son!” She laughed once more, tears trailing down her face. 

The Karstarks arrived the next morning with three hundred horsemen and nearly two thousand foot soldiers. The principal Stark bannermen were called down into the Great Hall. Four wolves, one even more monstrous than the ones she saw stand with the Stark boys lounged in the far side. _Wolves as pets._ Arianne shuddered and elected to sit as far from them as possible. 

Robb Stark, flanked on either side by his father’s ward and Jon opened with the news he learned from Arianne about what befell Ned Stark in King’s Landing and, more importantly, of what the Stark lord had learnt about the parentage of Cersei Lannister’s children. 

“On whose word do you base these accusations?” a lord called out from the back. “How are we to know this Targaryen boy is not merely seeking to use what befell Ned to his advantage?” 

“My brother Bran is a witness of the Lannister adultery,” Robb said, silencing the hall. Arianne saw more than one mouth fall agape before whispers broke out. 

Robb detailed the attempts on Bran’s life and invited the younger boy to speak of what he saw. 

The only sign of Bran’s nervousness were the hands bunched into fists by his side. So tight were they wound they were no doubt puncturing crescents into his palm. As he spoke of what he saw, he kept looking at Ser Gerold which told Arianne he meant to impress his hero. 

As she expected, the northern bannermen were furious. _Good,_ she thought. _If love for Aegon won’t bring them to our cause, I’ll settle for their hatred of Lannisters._

Lady Mormont asked how Ser Gerold was still alive. Robb’s answer surprised Arianne. He admitted outright that there was no battle at the Tower of Joy but that Lord Stark had let the Kingsguard go due to Lyanna’s deathbed intercession. 

The low level muttering in the hall grew into a buzz as Martyn Cassel, Ethan Glover and Theo Wull all confirmed Robb Stark’s words saying that the Kingsguard had vowed not to raise a rebellion to seat Viserys, the last known Targaryen, upon the throne. Her aunt remained silent but looked unsurprised. She’d clearly had some role in the invention of this tale. 

“I take it Ned did not know of your plan to seat your son upon the throne,” Lady Mormont quipped. Her daughter Dacey who Arianne met through her own cousins sat beside her in mail. 

“My only concern was my child’s survival,” Elia replied. “I had no idea then whether Aegon was even alive. I only meant to repay Lord Stark for his favour by reuniting him with his sister.” She spoke of the horrors that befell her during the sack, the bundling away of Aegon, the murder of Rhaenys and the baby she held in Aegon’s place and her fear that Aegon would be killed if news of his survival was ever found out. Those words silenced many of the murmurs of discontent about a Targaryen boy that had broken out. Jory Cassel helped too by sharing Ned Stark’s own intentions to protect Aegon and Elia when he found out the truth. 

A pale-eyed lord rose then and asked Elia whether it had always been her plan to throw the north into war with her son’s return. “Or would you have us believe you had no idea what the son you told the world was dead would do?” 

Arianne knew his face, she knew it for something but his name escaped her.

“Is that so surprising?” Lord Glover answered bluntly. “After all _you_ would have us believe you had no idea what your own bastard was doing _under_ your roof. My wife at least has the excuse of distance to call upon.”

 _Bolton,_ Arianne remembered. Jon had hunted down his bastard. He glared at her uncle but said nothing more. 

“Aegon promises to return my father and my sisters to us,” Robb told the assembled lords. “He promises to stand beside us in the Riverlands and to give us justice against the Lannisters. I have accepted his offer of friendship.”

There were muted protests of course about following the Mad King’s grandson but most were quelled when Robb assured them that he was not bending the knee. He was merely entering into an alliance against the Lannisters. His father would have the last word. 

Arianne Martell had come north to tie the Starks to Aegon’s cause. The king’s emissary had achieved her aim. Like the queen she was born to be, Arianne Martell had done her duty. 

From there, they moved on to discuss the order of the march now that the last of their host arrived. 

All of a sudden, a great lord, as tall as a giant stood. _Umber,_ she remembered. He bellowed that he would return his troop home if he was placed behind the Hornwoods and the Cerwyns in the order of march. 

Robb Stark merely welcomed him to do so. “And when we are done with the Lannisters,” he promised, scratching his wolf, who had moved to stand beside him, behind the ear, “we will march back north, root you out of your keep, and hang you for an oathbreaker.” 

The Greatjon flung a flagon of ale into the fire and cursed loudly. A Stark man-at-arms moved to restrain him and was knocked to the floor. The Umber lord picked up a table as if it were as light as a feather and threw it against a wall before unleashing his sword. Ser Gerold unleashed his own sword to protect Arianne and her aunt but Lord Glover had already placed his wife behind him. All along the benches steel was drawn but before anyone could move a grey blur flew past and the Greatjon was sprawled on the floor. His sword clanged to the floor three feet away. When he finally managed to stand his hand was dripping with blood from where the wolf had bitten off two fingers. Jon’s wolf was snarling into the crowd from Elia’s side. The largest of the wolves, however, stood on the dias watching them all menacingly, not saying a word. 

“My lord father taught me that it was death to bare steel against your liege lord,” Robb said, “but doubtless you only meant to cut my meat.” 

Arianne felt faint at the sight of the blood trailing down the Umber lord's hand. She grabbed Shireen by the hand, more for her own reassurance than the girl’s.

The Greatjon rose, sucking at the blood. Then, to her amazement he broke out into laughter. “Your meat,” he roared, “is bloody tough.”

“Uncle,” Arianne called out to Lord Glover when the assembly began to disperse. He sat on an empty bench. His brother, Galbart, had just left him. Her aunt was speaking to Jon, Robb Stark stood with the Umber lord, whose injuries were being seen by the maester. Ser Gerold was bent over speaking to Bran. 

“Is this seat taken?” 

“No.” 

Arianne sat beside him. “You’re angry,” she said twisting a ring around her finger. Her hands were clammy and her voice hoarse with nervousness. “At my aunt...at us all, I suppose...For what it’s worth, I didn’t know about Aegon either and _I_ was supposed to marry the man.”

Her aunt’s husband turned to look at her. “I find that very hard to believe,” he grunted. 

“Well,” Arianne sighed, “It’s the truth. My father shipped me off to him after I tried to run away and marry Willas Tyrell.”

Ethan Glover let out a snort of disbelief. 

“Don’t be so surprised!” she giggled. “You saw the sort of men he was asking me to marry. You even _met_ Lord Grandison!”

“And how did your suit go?” he asked with amusement in his voice now. 

“It didn’t,” she laughed. “I was caught before I even made it out of Dorne. Uncle Oberyn returned me to Sunspear and Father locked me up. Next thing I knew, I was being lugged onto a ship. I was sure Father was shipping me off to the Twins to be the wife of Lord Frey!”

That finally got him to smile. 

Arianne gave him the second of the three letters Aegon had sent her with. Now, she only needed to find Jon. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter began with Arianne riding in through the gates of Winterfell in my outline but then I started writing. Robb said she was in New Castle to Jon a few chapters ago and it didn’t seem likely to me that Lord Manderly would let them pass through without questions. Especially when Ser Gerold is with her. He then ended up quite literally taking over. It was another case of the characters leading me and not the other way around. In the books Wyman Manderly is staunchly loyal to House Stark but he’s always thinking about Manderly interests too. With Wylla married to Robb he’s going to be extra loyal but keen to exploit that connection to further his own interests. White Harbor has also benefited greatly from the Dornish/Norvoshi connection so he’ll be keen to keep the Martells close. 
> 
> There’s this general idea that Tywin Lannister is an unrivalled battle commander. I think people confuse military brilliance with ruthlessness. Tywin Lannister has a fearsome reputation but he’s mostly living off his own legend. I also blame Charles Dance’s commanding presence on screen for this idea as well. The reality is Tywin only resorted to the Red Wedding because a teenager was handing his arse to him consistently (even with all Roose Bolton’s efforts on the side to kill off his northern rivals’ men by constantly putting them on a platter for the Lannisters). How will Tywin cope with three pissed off teenagers (and 3 Kingsguard) this time round? 
> 
> The Brotherhood without Banners were also a thorn in his side but they were a small band and focused mainly on protecting the smallfolk. The riverlords were scattered. How does a son of the Riverlands returning to unite them change things? 
> 
> Raymund Darry, Beric and others died at the Battle of the Red Fork in canon but with The Mountain dead, Beric somewhat older, and many of the men wiser, assume more of them survived in this timeline. How? In canon, Winterfell’s very own Alyn saved many lives. Our boy was just more heroic this time round. You should know by now this fic only cares about the minor characters. 
> 
> You might be wondering why after their “reconciliation”’of sorts in the woods Elia and Ethan are more estranged than ever. When they had spoken back then Aegon’s conquest was an abstract idea. He’s now on the ground. Stannis is dead and Ethan thinks it’s all too convenient hence his questioning of Shireen. Elia also went ahead and told Jon his parentage against Ethan’s will. Even with that being the case, damn the man who says a word against Elia or raises a sword in her presence lol.
> 
> We’ve let Ned rot in the dungeons long enough. I think it’s time we visited him next lol.


	41. Eddard

**Eddard**

Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North slept and woke and mourned all in darkness. The straw underneath him reeked of urine. With no mattress or slop bucket and a crippled leg, he slept, defecated and ate in the same place. His leg throbbed endlessly, itching him out of sleep whenever he managed to doze off. If it wasn’t the nightmares, it was the incessant irritation in his leg under its old bandages. He would say months-old bandages but with no windows in his cell, nor sounds reaching him through the four-inch thick doors, his concept of time had long since fled with all else he’d lost. When he kept very still, his leg did not hurt so much, so he did his best to lie unmoving.

The only respite he got in his endless days were in his thoughts - not of people, those he loved, for thought of them only brought heart-ache - but in thoughts of home. In his dark, damp, tiny cell, Ned Stark thought of the expanse of the north with its snowy slopes and stony hills, great green pines and golden leaf oaks, the rushing streams and blue lakes fringed with fingers of white frost.

Sometimes, he could smell the strong smell of the pine-trees, see the glade-green spring fields of the farms in his land. He could hear the chirping of new-born chicks, the sounds of ewes and cows. His mouth salivated at the thought. It had been so long since he had meat. They gave him watery soup with questionable contents and hard bread he wouldn’t feed to a bird. The gaoler, a scarecrow of a man with a rat’s face and frayed beard, hardly came. When he did, he chucked a jug of water at Ned, spilling more contents than Ned had to drink and would wrench it away from him when he came back. 

Ned asked about his daughters. Of course he did but the man would only shout, “no talking,” and leave. It was the only voice Ned heard other than his own. The only sounds other than those that filled his dreams. 

The turnkey came once more. Each time he did, Ned told himself a day passed. He chucked the watery soup, stale bread and jug at Ned. Then he wrenched them away before Ned could get his fill. He needed more.

He lifted his head to sniff. The sky was grey and heavy with cloud and the air thick with the damp smell that preceded rain. He padded forward, paws crunching under the light snow on the forest floor. Underneath the smell of rain was one he knew well. The stream babbled loudly but he could hear _their_ sounds too. This far from the man cave, he didn’t need to rely on the odd stags he hunted with his sons. Here, the prey was plentiful, easy-pickings even. Sheep grazed freely, fence-less. Sometimes men came with them. He avoided them then. He found men with their metal claws not worth the trouble for their meat. The wood was plentiful and there were easier ways to feed. Other times, dogs watched over the sheep. When they did not run from him on sight, he disposed of them without trouble, feeding himself to his heart’s content. What was a dog to a wolf as large as he? 

It wasn’t hard to find food here like it was over the great ice wall where he had once hunted with his father, brothers and sister. He missed his pack most often when he needed to feed. His sons joined him sometimes but they protected their pink boys now. Something was happening in the man cave. He saw men marching and riding on horses, steel claws in hand, toward it. They each carried different wings, a metal fist, a pink man, a great one, a white sun. 

He spent his nights in the man cave now with his sons, sleeping in the great wood within its confines. He watched over the pink boys there. They were going south he knew. He’d join them when they did. His daughter was there. He sensed her sometimes, saw her singing to the moon, grey cousins at her side. The pink boys were going south to find their father and sister. The pink boys were his now as much as they were his sons’ but a wolf could not be caged. He needed to hunt. 

He stalked forward once more and darted out suddenly. The sheep, with their short legs, were no match for him even with his limp. His sons would have liked this, he thought, the black one loved to terrify. They scattered, he pursued, herding a few toward the streambed. With thicker snows they’d founder in its hold while he floated over it with his thicker paws. This dusting could not contain them in the same way. That was no issue, not really. The streambed would do that for him. He darted back and forth confusing them, preventing escape, enjoying it. They did as he wanted. He closed his jaw around a woolen neck, tearing at the rich, ripe flesh. He filled his belly with fresh meat and hot dark blood and when he was done, he licked his chops, raised his snout and sang to the falling star rising in the darkening sky. 

Ned awoke, chilled. Exhaustion seeped through him like he’d been wrung out with the washing. His throat was dry as a bone. So dry, he’d welcome the blood he drank in his dream. The dreams of a mad man. His lips were parched and cracked and his eyelids refused to stay open. No matter how hard he fought, they slid down, heavy as his heart.

He saw Lyanna then, in her bed of blood. He could not bear to look at her with his broken promises. He saw Brandon looking back at him on his horse, waving. _I took your bride to wife_ , _brother_ . He saw his father, telling him he was proud of him. _I did not keep Benjen by my side, Father_ . He saw Cat. _Our girls,_ he thought. _Cat, our girls. Are they with you?_ He saw them all, Jon, Robb, Bran risen from his bed, his baby Rickon, his girls. His girls were on the Wind Witch sometimes. Other times they were in the queen’s hands. He’d wring the woman’s neck then until she died. 

If only he’d waited a few hours more to see the girls safely upon the ship but he had to strike fast and hard in the dawn, before Cersei had acted. He had, but he was fooled. A man had no friends in King’s Landing and no brothers. _If only Cat had known who the man truly was. If only Brandon had finished the job._ He had no one to blame though, no one but himself.

Cersei Lannister had warned him. “ _When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die,”_ she whispered. Ned had played and lost, and his men had paid the price of his folly with their life’s blood.

He dreamt of Robert calling him an honourable fool, taunting him from his dream asking whether honour would protect his children, or the lives of those he loved. He thought back to their meeting in the crypts. ‘ _The king eats_ ,’ Robert had said, ‘ _and the Hand takes the shit.’_ . How he had laughed. Yet he had gotten it wrong. _The king dies_ , Ned Stark thought, _and the Hand is buried._

“Look at us, Ned,” Robert said. “Gods, how did we come to this? You here, and me killed by a pig. We won a throne together…” 

_I failed you, Robert,_ Ned thought. He could not say the words. _I lied to you, hid the truth. I let them kill you._ Whatever Robert had become, he was his brother. They grew up together, squired together, drank together, hunted together. Robert was closer to him than Brandon ever was. Underneath it all, he was a good man. _A man I loved._ He’d lied to him and cheated but he had loved him to the end. He let him die, all while trying to save lives. _People died anyway._

They came to him in his dreams and he cursed them all. Littlefinger, Janos Slynt and his gold cloaks, the queen, the Kingslayer, Pycelle and Varys and Ser Barristan, even Lord Renly, Robert’s own blood, who had run when he was needed most. Yet in the end he blamed himself most. “Fool,” he cried to the darkness, “thrice-damned blind fool.” 

Even in this despair, no tears came to his eyes. He was a Stark of Winterfell, and his grief and his rage froze hard inside him.

He was burning though. The flames lit him up from within, he could almost see them when he closed his eyes. His body was sore and aching and wet. Even so, he’d take the fever over the chills that came upon him suddenly. He had nothing to cover himself with. 

His mind wandered to his brother Brandon often. Brandon too had been thrown in the black cells to fester until Father came to free him. _Fool_ , Ned had called him in anger at his rashness before. Ned was not meant for all this. It was Brandon’s. Ned stepped into _his_ mantle, married _his_ bride, ruled _his_ lands, did _his_ duty. He didn’t want it. Not at first anyway. 

The wolf-blood brought an end to Brandon. He’d always been too hasty, led by his feelings. Ned’s own clear mind had brought him here. How was he any better than Brandon? Had not his own heart brought him here? 

_‘Starks belong in the North,’_ Brandon said to him more than once. _‘Too long in the south and we melt. Why do you think we’ve never ruled further than the Neck?’_ The south had fed on them all. Lyanna, Brandon, Father. Growing up in the Eyrie hadn’t saved Ned either. There was no place for the white peaks of Jon Arryn’s honour here. _No place for mercy._

 _‘You rule like a man dancing on rotten ice,’_ Littlefinger had said to him. _‘I daresay you will make a noble splash.’_ He had. Now he was buried deep in the underbelly of the Red Keep. Deeper than he ever dared dream. 

That was not to say he hadn’t built himself shelters of hope. First a lean-to, then a hut, slowly a castle. The queen would not kill him. If she wanted to, he would have been cut down with his men. She wanted him weak and desperate but she wanted him alive. Cat held her brother after all. Ned had sent his own instructions north too. Moat Cailin would be manned by now, he knew. Ethan Glover always answered the call. White Harbor’s defences would be strengthened as well. Tywin Lannister had no hopes of setting his eyes further north than The Neck. He would flounder as all those before him had. Ned allowed himself a brief feeling of satisfaction then. He’d wanted the man’s demise ever since he came across Elia covered in blood all those years ago. 

Then there was Stannis. Resolute, stubborn, dutiful Stannis. He’d won Robert’s war for him as much as Ned or Jon Arryn had. He defeated the Ironborn even before Ned and Robert ever set foot on Pyke, all without a smidge of naval experience. Stannis Baratheon was a fearful foe to have and Cersei Lannister would learn so to her dismay. Her and her father who set his sights on the Riverlands. The Vale would rally to Stannis’ cause for Jon. The Riverlands would follow as would the North. The Stormlands were his with Renly’s fall. Their kingdoms had won a war together before. 

That was not to say strong winds did not batter his fortress. There was still that business in the south with Elia’s boy. The more Ned thought of him, the more he accepted its truth. If they were still alive, the White Bull, Arthur and Oswell were by his side. The Reach had been the last to surrender. Would they take up the mantle to seat Rhaegar’s son upon his ancestors’ throne? Would the north split? The boy was Elia’s after all, Ethan’s own son by marriage. _Ethan is true_ , Ned told himself. He would place duty above love. He snorted derisively then. _As you have?_ He asked himself. He sacrificed his honour for love. 

Stannis would not give in so easily. _A war on three-fronts_. The Lannisters would fall but who would be the last man standing? 

He heard the heavy creaking of the door and pushed himself toward the light, putting a hand to the damp wall to lift himself up. Pain shot through his leg. The glare of torches - more than one - made him squint. He shielded his eyes with the back of a hand and squinted. 

“Food, please,” he croaked.

Men filed in. Red cloaked and lion-breasted, they placed four torches into holders he’d never seen in the dark of his cell. He saw the dirty straw for the first time, stained in his own body’s waste. 

He saw her then, golden haired, red gowned, a roaring lion sewn into the belly of her dress. 

“Tie up the prisoner,” she ordered. 

Ned was weak, dying probably, and weaponless but he’d use the last of his strength to choke the life out of her. It seemed she knew it too. He straightened himself. Unable to stand, he held his arms out for them to place the shackles on and sneered, “Wise choice.” 

“Leave us,” she ordered the men. The grey door of splintered wood, four inches thick and studded with iron, shut behind them. She stood at the cell’s edge, back hugging the door as if she still feared him.

“You reek,” she said, looking down her nose at him. She covered it with a handkerchief. “A shame it had to come to this. You could have been regent, Lord Stark. You could have slept on silk sheets, had a queen beside you. Now you sleep in your own shit and my son sits upon your dead friend’s throne.” 

“For how long?” Ned asked. “If I know Stannis at all, he will be coming for you any moment now. You think the gold cloaks are any protection against the strength of Stannis’ armies?” If he was Stannis, Ned would swoop down on King’s Landing before Tywin Lannister and the cronies he sent to ravage the Riverlands had the chance to return. 

She scoffed. “Do dead men conquer cities, my lord?” Her voice dripped with sweet poison. “Oh,” she laughed, clapping her hands at Ned’s look of shock. “Of course, you wouldn’t know. How silly of me! No news comes here after all.” She smiled again at him, as she had when he was dragged away from the dead bodies of his men. “Stannis Baratheon is as dead as his brothers, so if you’re expecting rescue, I regret to tell you, don’t.” She paused for a moment and said, “Pah, why lie? I don’t regret telling you that, at all. You are at my mercy, Lord Stark to do with you as I please.” 

The walls of his castle began to crack, but a castle had never been felled by one crack alone. Doran Martell had not yet spoken. 

“There was once a mad king who unjustly murdered his lords,” Ned told her. “I do not need to remind you how his reign ended.” 

“He killed your father,” she said softly. “Jaime recalled how he did so more than once. He spoke of how he screamed as he was cooked, how hard your brother fought to save him all while he choked to death. Jaime described it in such detail that I could smell the cooking flesh, see the beautiful fire consume him.” Her eyes flashed green as molten wildfire. 

Ned felt bile rushing past his dry throat and heaved into his bed of filthy straw. 

“Still, my son is no Mad King. Who would blame him for the filthy deeds of outlaws whose heads line my walls and a rabid dog who killed its master?”

Ned wiped his hand over his mouth and pushed himself forward. “What do you want?” he asked. “We both know you will not kill me so long as Cat holds your brother.” 

“Cat?” she asked with a mocking lilt. “Your wife?” She laughed softly. “Your dead wife does not hold Tyrion.” 

A sudden coldness stabbed at Ned’s core. 

“Shame on me,” Cersei said once more, tapping at her head like one forgetful. “Of course, you did not know. Your lady took the high road with a small guard and was struck by the wildlings of those mountains you know so well. I heard her wound festered until she died in pain.”

The pain in his leg disappeared almost immediately to make way for deep, heavy, numbing grief. 

Cersei Lannister continued speaking. “If only I knew who the man who struck the blow was, I’d give him his own holdfast for ridding me of such a pest.”

“I don’t believe you.” 

“Why would I lie to you?” she questioned. “Besides, even if she _did_ hold Tyrion, I cannot say I’d particularly _miss_ the dwarf. He is a Lannister. I cannot let the slight go for that alone. In any case, I suppose my feelings do not matter. Tyrion slipped through her fingers. I expect he’s dead by now, somewhere in the Mountains of the Moon. _Good riddance,”_ she spat. “He killed my mother, you know?” 

“I cannot say I care.” 

She stared at him then. He returned her gaze, cold, hard and as unforgiving as the land from which he hailed. She looked away first. 

“You fear something,” he said, grinning at the monster before him. The mask of composure fell for a second. “Elsewise you wouldn’t deign to bring yourself here. What is it?” he asked again and spoke before she could reply. “Whatever it is, you should know that I take pleasure in anything that steals your sleep.” The shadow of Robert’s mark upon her face had long since faded. In its place her face bore the under-eye shadows of the bone-tired. “I tried to save you, Cersei Lannister, both you and your children. But now...you must lie in the bed you made. I, of course, will revel in your fall,” Ned told her. “Whatever comes next, I would gladly give my life to know your fall was coming.” 

“I asked you once whether you love your children, Lord Stark. Do you remember?” 

He did. Robert had asked him the same question once and he answered both of them with the same words. _With all my heart._

“If you love them as much as I do, you would do anything to see them survive, just as I have,” she went on. “I’ve killed for my children, I’ve cheated and lied and will do every act without honour to see them survive. Will you?” The golden fire of the torches glinted against her eyes. “Perhaps you care naught for your own life. What of the lives of your daughters? Pretty Sansa and that little animal of yours. I could have them paraded naked in the streets, such pretty girls...I must admit even the dark-haired one has some allure to her. How would their heads look on spikes? Perhaps I’d give them to my men to-” 

Ned threw the straw in her face, blinding her momentarily as she spluttered. He threw his weight forward, dragging her down. She screamed. He wrapped his hands around her white throat and squeezed. Pain tore through his leg, blinding him. His hands tightened further, a response to his own agony, anger, fury, loss. 

A boot kicked him in the face. Cersei Lannister was dragged out, limp but alive. Boots fell upon him. _Cat._ Then came darkness. 

Silence overwhelmed the man cave. Men stood still. The small boy sniffed quietly - his golden-eyed son’s boy. The boy gripped his son’s furs hard. They all stood there, all his sons. The only one of the pink boys missing was the one who belonged to his white-furred son. Their eyes were red. More men in metal furs came through the gates. They were holding a blue wing with a white bird. One man among them stood out. Old but strong, he wore a fish on his cloak and her. He knew her smell from his sons. Faint as it was, she’d faded, he knew her still. His sons knew her. The small boy howled. His black son joined. She was in a box. She smelt of death and bone. 

Ned’s head pounded like someone had taken an iron hammer and clubbed him to within an inch of his life. _They did._ Pain rushed through his crushed leg from his toes, up his calf all the way into his brain, spreading through each limb of his body. He struggled to sit himself up, taking the weight off his leg. The agony engulfed him body and soul.

 _Cat,_ he thought desperately. “Cat!” he screamed, hoarse and quiet. Tears stung his eyes. Cat was gone. He knew it then. He didn’t understand quite how but she was gone. She’d been his wife for seventeen years. He’d loved her. She gave him five beautiful children. _And now she’s gone._ The tears stung but they did not fall. A hollow chasm opened up in his chest in the place that once held his heart. His children, his wife. He’d never see Cat again. He’d never lie at her breast, feel her fingers combing through his hair. He’d never hold her again, love her again. 

He wondered when he last cried. _When Benjen left for the wall?_ He’d cried at Old Nan’s feet that day. 

His guts twisted, his mind flashing with visions of his boys. Bran sniffling quietly, Robb standing resolute, gripping his hands until they were white, Rickon wailing. A gnawing grief battled the pain in his leg and won. His children. His wife.

 _My daughters._ His girls. He punched down hard into the straw. He’d brought his daughters to the hell that ate his father and his brother. Would he live to lose them the way he had Lyanna?

_When you play the game of thrones…_

_Fool,_ he thought. What good was a father who left his daughters to the lions? 

He lost all hold of time. The turnkey came and went. Ned ate but never tasted a thing. He lost his mind more each day. He felt an animal. He hunted like one in his dreams. He spoke to himself less and less each day and sat with his ghosts. 

The walls of his castle eroded with each day that passed. He woke and slept all in darkness. Only in his dreams did he see anything. Winterfell, the wolfswood...then they were marching south. Robb and Jon at the head, wolves beside them. His boys were marching south, he told himself and even the hope filled him with horror. _They are too young._ They were still babies. Robb was married but he was little more than a boy. Ned’s boy. 

And Jon. His heart broke then. Ned knew he would not live long. His wound began to fester. It oozed liquid of a colour he could not see. The smell told him enough though. He thought it a miracle he was still alive at all and not poisoned by his own blood. He didn’t mind dying. He just didn’t want to do so before he saw the boy again, held him and spoke to him again. _You are mine_ , he’d tell him. _You may not have my name but you are my blood. You are my son in every way that matters._

 _Just when I started to right the wrongs done to him_. For years Ned had hoped Cat would soften. Jon was everything one could want in a son, except he wasn’t hers. When he saw that would never change, he began to plan for the boy with his brother. They’d see to it that Lya’s boy never wanted for anything. Ned would raise him to be a lord, see to it that the boy married well and was content. It would still happen, he supposed. Whether he lived or died. Ned Stark was only one man who stood on the shoulders of the men who followed him. Ethan Glover would see to it, Howland and Theo too...and Martyn, the mountain left to him from his father. 

Ned only hoped the boy would forgive him, that he would understand and he hoped against all that Elia would see to it that her son and Jon were brothers. He wondered if they reached Greywater Watch yet.

Ashara once asked... _Would you have raised them together, Ash?_ Perhaps if he’d let her, he’d never have had to live believing in her death...

He remembered seeing the two boys together at Winterfell. They laughed and drank together. Robb was there too as was Arya...his sweet girl now at the hands of Cersei Lannister. 

He knew then that he would do whatever the woman asked of him. He sacrificed his honour before for those he loved. He would do so again. He would do whatever was asked of him. What could they do to him beyond killing him? He was half-dead anyway. As long as his girls lived, he’d swear the truth of whatever they asked of him. He’d swear it by the Seven they held so close. His last rebellion. 

His head was bent, forehead resting on his knuckles, mouth dry with thirst. From outside his cell came the rattle of iron chains. Ned raised his gaze and squinted. One torch this time. 

“Food,” he croaked. 

“Wine,” a voice answered. 

He took the offered wineskin. The sour wine burnt his gullet. _A Dornish red._ When he looked up, it was not the rat-faced man; this gaoler was stouter, shorter, though he wore the same leather…“Varys?” he said groggily when it came. He touched the crouching man’s face. “I’m not … not dreaming this. You’re here.” The eunuch’s plump cheeks were covered with a dark stubble of beard. Ned felt the coarse hair with his fingers. Varys had transformed himself into a grizzled turnkey, reeking of sweat and sour wine. “How did you … what sort of magician are you?”

“I’m no magician, milord,” he said in a gruff voice. “Just Rugen the turnkey. I’ve served as so since the days of His Grace, King Aerys.” The rough voice dropped then. “The undergaoler charged with overseeing the…” he looked around, “seldom used black cells.” He smiled then. “Drink,” he said again.

Ned’s hands fumbled at the skin. “Is this the same poison they gave Robert?” He’d drink it gladly. He had no fear of death anymore. 

“You wrong me,” Varys said sadly. “Truly, no one loves a eunuch. Give me the skin.” He sat beside Ned on his bed of old straw streaked with waste and drank. A trickle of red leaked from the corner of his plump mouth. “It’s not quite the Arbor gold you offered me the night of the tourney, but no more poisonous than most,” he concluded, wiping his lips. “Here.”

“How?” Ned asked him, gesturing at the leathers Varys wore, the scratchy beard and the scars upon his face. 

Varys told him then of how he’d taken on the role of turnkey more than twenty years before. He narrated all this in a gruff speech, almost revelling in the chance to share his secret with someone else. Rugen came and went as he pleased. He had a damp cell near the cells. No one bothered him apparently seeing as the other turnkeys were scared of him. “Keep your head down, attract no attention and you can do as you please,” he said in his own voice. “It was a lesson you did not learn.”

Ned grunted. 

“How is your leg, my lord?” 

“Crippled.” Whatever Pycelle had done to treat him was undone. 

“You might not count it so, but it was a blessing the Kingslayer attacked you when he did.” 

Ned glared at him.

“Had you not been injured, my lord, you would have ridden out at the head of the detachment you sent north...and you would have been taken hostage.” Tywin Lannister had hoped to ambush him as retaliation for what Catelyn did with the Imp. “Castles are good, as is land, but Tywin Lannister needed _you_ to get his son back...I suppose he needs you no longer. You have heard about what befell your sweet lady?” 

“The men?” Ned asked. He’d sent his own with Lord Beric. _Alyn, Harwin...have you died because of me too?_

“There was a skirmish...a slaughter truth be told but some survived. Is there anyone in particular you wish to ask about? Thoros of Myr is still alive. Lord Beric escaped with his life though he was injured…” 

“My daughters…” Ned said. 

“Just the one. The younger girl escaped Ser Meryn and fled,” Varys told him. “I have not been able to find her. Nor have the Lannisters. A kindness, there. Our new king loves her not. Your older girl is still betrothed to Joffrey. Cersei keeps her close. She came to court a few days ago to plead that you be spared. A pity you couldn’t have been there, you would have been touched.”

 _Arya._ Ned felt his head spin. 

Varys took a dreg of drink and wiped his mouth. “I do not think the poor girl ever imagined the result of her midnight dash to the queen would be so dire for her...” 

“Midnight dash?” 

Sansa had run to Cersei despite his express prohibition to tell her of his plans to send the girls north. 

_Oh Sansa,_ Ned thought. He’d spent so long talking to Arya, his wolf-blooded girl, warning her of the dangers they’d faced that he had never thought of watching over Sansa. She’d always done as she was told. _She wanted to be queen._

Ned Stark thought grief could not choke him any further but thought of Arya, his little girl, robbed him of air. Where was she? _She must be so scared._

“Do not beat yourself up,” Varys said, almost kindly. “Whether Lady Sansa spoke to the queen or not, you do understand _you_ were dead the moment the moment you walked into that hall?” 

“If that is true, slit my throat and be done with it.” He was dizzy from the wine, tired and heartsick.

“Your blood is the last thing I desire...You do know taking Littlefinger into your confidence instead of myself is the reason why you find yourself here?” 

Ned scoffed bitterly. If only he could see the man. He would do to him what he failed to do to Cersei Lannister. “Was I to trust you?” He frowned. The eunuch was no better than the man Cat had once called brother. “When they slaughtered my guard, you stood beside the queen and watched, and said not a word.” 

“And would again. I seem to recall that I was unarmed, unarmored, and surrounded by Lannister swords. Still, had you asked me, I would have told you not to trust the man that planned your fall from long before you stepped foot in this city. I did warn you of him.” He sighed wearily then, theatrically so almost. “No one ever trusts a eunuch.” 

Ned glared at him in hatred, sickened. He felt dozy, sweaty. Shivers ran down his spine. “Give up the act,” he grunted. “Say what you have to say and go.” 

“You came to me once, looking for the man who killed Lord Arryn.”

“You sent me to Ser Hugh of the Vale.”

“No, my lord,” the eunuch answered. “ _You_ came to that conclusion all alone. _I_ told you of a boy who owed all he was to Lord Arryn...one who when the widow fled to the Eyrie with her household, stayed in King’s Landing and prospered.” 

Ned’s mind stuttered for a moment as he made the connections between Varys’ words. It hit him like a punch to the gut. “Littlefinger,” he wheezed. “Littlefinger killed Jon. Why?” 

“Love of power mostly, self-interest too. A whoremonger would never fare well in a court ruled by Stannis. A desire to see all those who took what was his fall is another. _You_ took his beloved Lady Catelyn. Every man on the small council had heard of the sweet nectar between your wife’s thighs.” 

Ned grabbed the eunuch’s collar tight. Fury surged through him. “Do not speak of her!”

“I am only telling you of what I know,” he said, coughing when Ned let him go. He rubbed his throat. “There is nothing Littlefinger loves more than chaos.” The Spider said after a moment. “When old houses fall, new ones take their place. What is sweeter than rising while seeing all those who belittled you crushed underfoot?” 

Varys told him all then, of Littlefinger and Lysa’s affair, the child they lost in Riverrun when she married Jon, the fear she had of her child being taken. Lysa killed him. 

_She killed Jon. She killed Jon and blamed the Lannisters. She threw us to the fire._ It all started to make sense, the conflicting reports of where Jon had intended to send his son, the subsequent silence from Lysa, the silencing of Jon who would see Stannis rise...

“Why say nothing?” Ned demanded hotly. 

“Would you have believed me?” 

The woman was his own sister by marriage. She was married to his foster father. She killed her husband. _Jon._ She had thrown him into the pit of lions. For what? Littlefinger? Cat died following her folly. 

“Lord Baelish will not rest until you follow your foster father to the grave, my lord. Your good-father will not be long behind you, not with Lord Tywin and his son surrounding him. Even now, our dearest Lord Baelish is doing his utmost to see to your demise. He whispers day and night into King Joffrey’s ear about the threat you pose to his realm. After all, you didn’t particularly help yourself when you told the boy he had no claim upon the throne. Ah,” he sighed. “It has been so long since I played the game against one so...unscrupulous, so unashamed in his desire to climb higher.” He turned to Ned then. “He wants your daughter. He has all but begged for her hand. The queen has refused him of course...as Lord Tully once did when he asked for your dear lady’s hand.”

Ned scowled at him, angry. Angry at himself, at Baelish, at the man who came to gloat in his cell.

Varys drunk more of the wine. Ned ran his gaze down over his turnkey’s uniform, down until he saw the brown-stained straw he slept upon himself. Ned reeked. His cell did too. The man took no notice of it all. He sat there unfazed, holding the wineskin Ned had held with his dirty hands. 

As if he could read his mind, the eunuch spoke then. “This?” he asked, looking between Ned’s hands and the wineskin. “I grew up on the streets, my lord. I learnt not to say no to food when offered a long time ago. How do you think I got to this size?” 

Ned studied the eunuch’s face, searching for truth beneath the mummer’s scars and false stubble. He tried some more wine. This time it went down easier. 

“Can you free me from this pit?” he asked. 

“I could … but will I? Questions would be asked, and the answers would lead back to me.” 

Ned had expected no more. “You are blunt.” 

“A eunuch has no honor, and a spider does not enjoy the luxury of scruples, my lord.”

“Would you at least consent to carry a message out for me?” 

“That would depend on the message. I will gladly provide you with paper and ink, if you like. And when you have written.. I will decide whether it serves my purposes. I must ask though, what strange fit of madness led you to tell the queen that you had learned the truth of Joffrey’s birth?”

“The madness of mercy,” Ned admitted. He’d been thinking of Elia, of the children in the blood-stained cloaks and the screams. 

“Ah,” said Varys. “To be sure. You are an honest and honorable man, Lord Eddard. Ofttimes, I forget that. I have met so few of them in my life.” He glanced around the cell. “When I see what honesty and honour have won you, I understand why.” 

Ned Stark laid his head back against the damp stone wall and closed his eyes. His leg was throbbing, his head worse. He could taste blood. _Horse, sweet and dark…_

“How does it feel?” Varys asked, “To know your own wants killed your friend?” 

Ned had ages in his hole to wallow on that question.

“Don’t trouble yourself overmuch,” he continued. “Robert was always going to die. He was becoming unruly, and Cersei needed to be rid of him to free her hands to deal with his brothers. Stannis and Renly were quite a pair. The iron gauntlet and the silk glove.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Now they are dead and you will not come out of this unscathed. You ought to have heeded Littlefinger when he urged you to support Joffrey’s succession. I believe he was honest in advising you in that one instance.” 

“How … how could you know of that?” 

Varys smiled. “I know, that’s all that need concern you. I also know that on the morrow the queen will pay you a visit. After her last experience in this cell, she will come to you this time with a finger from the dainty hand of your dear daughter to help you along in your decision-making.” 

“She wouldn’t.” Raw panic was clear in his voice. 

“Wouldn’t she? She’s desperate and afraid and her survival depends on you. Stannis and Renly may be dead...but her beloved Jaime is fighting the river lords even now. The Tyrells brood in their indignation and if Ser Loras dies she is done for, friendless as she is. Weeks ago she would be unmoved, resting her back against her father but now your son marches down the Neck with a northern host at his back.”

 _Robb._ He thought of himself, not much older than his son and of all he lost at that time. Now history repeated itself. 

“Robb is only a boy.”

“A boy with an army at his back.” Varys stood then and smacked the hay off his breeches and cloak. 

“As if that wasn’t enough,” he added as an afterthought. He removed the torch from it’s holder. “Princess Elia’s boy has taken Dragonstone with the Golden Army and a Dornish host at his back. Now all of a sudden, _you_ are Cersei’s last hope. Princess Elia, I hear, marches south with the northern host. Were your son to ally himself with King Aegon…So you see, Cersei must get you to cooperate with her. In exchange for your daughter’s life, she will ask you to return the northern army home, broker a peace with the riverlords and the knights of the Vale and see an end to the Targaryen claimant.” 

The eunuch spoke but there was one thing Ned did not understand. _It’s all too quick._ Only weeks ago Varys had said the boy lived...then he understood. “You knew!” He shouted. “You knew!” 

Varys smiled. “Who do you think saw Prince Aegon to safety?” 

“You were the courtier…”

“You and I have more in common than you think, my lord,” he said as he walked out of the door. “Whatever I may be, I cannot stand by and watch the slaughter of children.” Then the darkness swallowed Ned with the closing of the door. 

Someone was shaking him. “My lord,” the voice said. “You’re burning up, hotter than a pot over the cooking fire.” The hand was gentle but still jarred him.

He opened his eyes and squinted. Ginger whiskers.

“Tom?” he croaked. _Fat Tom!_

“Aye, my lord. Can you stand?” 

Another man came in and lifted Ned’s arms over his own shoulders and lifted him. Tom lifted his other side.

“Am I dreaming?” His head throbbed with the force of a battering ram. The movement sent a shot of pain from his crippled leg through his entire body. It made him dizzy for a moment such that he missed whatever Tom had said. He turned his head to see the other man. Ser Aron Santagar. 

He looked ahead as they moved him toward the door. 

“I told you I would never forget what you did for my sister.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I planned from very early on to have a Tyrell POV later on in this story but over the last week, the more I thought about it, the less sense some of the decisions taken in that chapter seemed to make with Ser Loras dead. So, I hope you’ll forgive the retconning, I’ve decided to keep Ser Loras alive for now. He’s badly injured but in Cersei’s hands.  
> As for Cersei, I wondered whether Ned would hit a woman and concluded in the end, he’d do whatever he could to someone who tried to harm his children. 
> 
> Pray for Littlefinger...or maybe don’t lol. Ned’s developed a taste for blood haha. As a side note, I love every chapter Varys pops up in. Every single time he does, he inadvertently ruins another person’s life. This time it’s Littlefinger and Lysa though I think in this instance she’s collateral.
> 
> I’m still wondering what to do with Lysa so would welcome all thoughts. I think Ned would have mercy on her because she’s Cat’s sister but I also think he’d grit his teeth and pursue justice. What would Ned do? Think of a jaded Ned who has learnt that mercy isn’t always good..
> 
> One small thing I love in the books is that Ned confesses to treason by swearing upon the Seven. Ned never cared for them lol. I like to think it was his middle finger at the farce, a futile action but an act of resistance nonetheless.
> 
> Ned began having ‘strange’ dreams when his leg was first injured. It’s only gotten stronger...our boy is going mad(!) #not. 
> 
> As for Tom, Ned sent Fat Tom to Dorne in his last chapter. I’m going to assume Doran sent him back. I thought Ned could do with a northern companion.


	42. Arya

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter starts a few days after Arya’s last chapter and then continues until round about where the last chapter ended.

**Arya**

Arya ran. _Swift as a deer_ , she zigzagged down the small side street, narrowly avoiding a pie cart. 

“Hot pies!” The peddler cried out behind her. She’d ask him for help if she thought he could offer any but he couldn’t. Not against these men. 

She jumped over a barricade. _I just need to get to the Street of Sisters._ She tripped, slipped and fell. She _hated_ this part of Flea Bottom. King’s Landing had half a million people if Maester Luwin was to be believed, and here the sewage from all of them ran down the badly cobbled streets. Only rain seemed to clean them and since it hadn’t rained in weeks…

They were catching up on her. She saw them. The three. One of them was the furry tongued man she’d stabbed with Needle in the alley. She obviously hadn’t hurt him as badly as she thought she did. 

She jumped to her feet and dashed once more, down Strand Alley, past the bakery with the three copper tarts, left into the pot shop Hot Pie took her to that one time. 

“Thought you could outrun us?” a voice asked from behind her. 

She threw her wooden sword hard in his face and ran. Syrio had it filled with lead.

The third man blocked her right. Her wooden sword lay on the ground at the feet of the second man. There were people outside the pot shops but none raised a hand to help her. 

Arya gulped and stepped back into the alley behind her. _Quiet as a shadow._

The man with the furry tongue appeared then. Arya stepped deeper into the shadows. She had nothing to protect her now. She had Needle but the Gold Cloaks patrolled this part of Flea Bottom. They might not see into this alley to help her, or care what happens to a street urchin like her but they would care if she killed someone. She’d seen them cut down a seven year old for stealing. _What would they do to me if they saw Needle covered with blood?_ Worse, what would they do if they saw her castle forged steel? _The queen would have my head._

Even so, Arya felt under her cloak for Needle and gripped it tight. Then she stood side face as Syrio taught her. _Fear cuts deeper than swords._

For every step Furry Tongue took toward her she took one back. She might escape one but not three. 

“I... I have the pox," Arya blurted, desperate to make them leave. They walked forward, she stepped back and back again until the wall pushed her back. "I have been vomiting for days and my arms are full of scabs.” That was true. Granted, she _didn’t_ have the pox, or at least hoped she didn’t, but fleas had feasted on her. “You had best be away. If you come near me, you will catch it and die most painfully." 

Furry Tongue inspected her more closely. "You do not look sickly. Dirty mayhaps but not ill."

"I am though. I should be dead before morning."

“I don’t think I care,” he breathed. “I promised to fuck you bloody, you little bitch.” He drew out a dagger. “I’ll skewer you right through with this.”

“There!” she heard a woman shout. 

Arya’s three attackers turned round to see what caused the commotion. They blocked her view but she could hear the drawing of swords. 

It was as if the world around her moved at a speed too fast, paralysed by fear as she was. The men tried to scarper. The one she’d struck with her wooden sword was cut down. The third that had blocked her way earlier drew a dagger and aimed for one of the Gold Cloaks. His arm was cut clean off. His screams filled the air. Arya hugged the wall behind her, hiding away from the Gold Cloaks. It only took one recognising her. 

She heard clinking metal as a City Watch officer slinked forward. “You swine,” he muttered, before she heard a dead weight hit the ground. “Take him,” the officer said. “He’ll serve in the black cells at His Grace’s pleasure. Filthy raper might end up losing more than just his balls.” 

Arya hoped the shadow covered her well enough. She closed her eyes and held her breath, wishing all the while that the man would leave. 

“Girl,” he said, in a low gruff voice. “Look at me.” 

Arya took a deep breath, hand still clasped on Needle under her cloak, she turned apprehensively. _Please, don’t know me._ She opened her eyes. _Calm as still water._ Arya hated the Gold Cloaks with a passion. The talk in Flea Bottom was that they had thrown in with the Lannisters, their commander raised to a lord, with lands on the Trident and a seat on the king’s council. They’d helped the Lannisters kill her father’s men. 

“Are you alright?” he asked. He was a short, stocky man, dressed in the gold of the City Watch. He was older than her father but had a kind look about him. _He doesn’t know who I am,_ she realised. If he did, even the kindest person in the world would hand over to the queen for the reward. _It’s what the stable boy wanted._

 _Did you attack my father too?_ Arya wondered. She nodded in answer to him. 

He looked at her for a while and Arya’s heart lurched into her mouth. 

“Go home,” he said. “You shouldn’t walk the streets alone.” 

The Gold Cloaks left, but the woman who’d been with them stayed. She had a tall man with her, her guard perhaps. She was well dressed. Her shiny black hair was streaked with grey. Her skin was fair and unblemished. She was tall if a little plump. She clearly had money. 

“Are you sure you’re alright?” she asked Arya. 

“Yes,” Arya replied before adding, “My lady.”

The woman chuckled. “Hear that, Zekko,” she said to the man behind her, “I am a lady.” She spoke with an accent that told Arya she was not from Westeros. “I’m no lady.” the woman told her. “Now, come along. We’ll take you home.”

 _Home._ The word alone could make her cry. She was heading home the day they killed Syrio. _He’d been telling me he’d let me spar with Needle when we got to Winterfell._

“You dropped your purse, my lady,” Arya said instead, pointing at the fat purse on the ground. 

The woman smiled at her and thanked Arya. Her guard picked it up for her. The woman turned to her side. “Show us the way,” she said. 

“It’s alright,” Arya tried. “Really. Thank you. I’ll manage.”

The tall woman shook her head with a determined look on her round face. “I cannot see a girl nearly assaulted by strange men and leave her. I will take you home to your family. Show us the way.”

“My family aren’t...here,” Arya mumbled.

“Where are they?”

Arya raised her eyes to the Red Keep up on Aegon’s High Hill. Both prison and royal residence, it loomed over everything in the city. Her father was there and Sansa. They’d killed Hullen and Desmond and Syrio there. Her eyes clouded with tears. 

The woman lifted Arya’s chin gently so that Arya looked up at her. “They’re dead,” she said.

Arya bit her lip and gulped.

“How long have you been here?” 

Arya tried to count the weeks. ”I don’t remember.” 

“Hmm,” the woman sighed. “Where are the rest of your belongings?” 

Arya turned and grabbed her wooden sword that lay on the street. “I don’t have anything else.” Needle was under her cloak. 

“What’s your name?” 

“Nan,” Arya said at once. It was the name she shared with Hot Pie and she couldn’t think of another. 

The woman smiled. “I am Yna,” she said. “But in this land they call me Mistress Mott. As if I was born tied to my husband’s hip. He is a Master armorer with a shop on the Street of Steel. I cannot say I much care for this dirty city with its robbers and rapers but my husband seems to do well here and seeing as I cannot leave him,” she said good-naturedly and huffed with a smile that belied the melancholy with which she finished, “I have found myself stuck here.” 

Arya returned her smile. 

“We have a large enough house, and servants to help Tobho - that is my husband - in the shop, but I am in need of a maid. Tell me,” she asked, “can you clean, mend clothes, do any household task I may ask of you?”

“I can mend your gowns,” Arya said, “but I can’t make you a new one. My sister was the one who was always good at that.” She didn’t realise she’d blurted that until she’d finished talking. Thought of Sansa alone in the Red Keep made her sad. 

Mistress Mott, Yna, chuckled. 

They walked down the Street of Sisters, past the square at its end, and followed the Street of Steel up it’s winding path round Visenya’s hill. The street was busy. Blacksmiths worked at open forges and freeriders haggled over mail shirts. Grizzled ironmongers sold old blades and razors from their wagons. The farther they climbed, the larger the buildings grew. At the top of the hill was a huge house made of timber and plaster. It’s upper stories loomed over the narrow street. 

The closer they got to it, the more littered the street grew with knights and free riders milling about outside the bigger smith shops. Arya avoided the Street of Steel for this very reason. The Gold Cloaks infested it too. 

She drew her cloak tightly around her and kept her head down. _Quiet as a shadow,_ she whispered. Her heart hammered in her chest. 

“Are you alright, child?” Mistress Mott asked, concern clear on her face.

Arya nodded, too scared to speak. 

Not a single one of the Gold Cloaks or the assembled knights even looked at her. It was almost as if she was invisible. No one gave a dirty girl a second look. They were all looking for Arya of Winterfell, clean and noble. _How am I supposed to stay clean if I spend weeks on the streets?_ Even the ones the queen had clad in the Stark uniform hadn’t recognised her. If she hadn’t been so scared, she might have laughed at their stupidity. 

**“** Ah,” Mistress Mott, said. “Here we are.” They stood outside the large house made of timber. It’s double doors showed a hunting scene carved in ebony and weirwood. A pair of stone knights stood sentry at the entrance, armored in fanciful suits of polished red steel that transformed them into griffin and unicorn. 

“Mistress, there ye are!” a slim girl said, walking over to them. She took the mistress’ cloak at once. The shop sold crafting knives as well as daggers, swords and fine armour. 

“Ora, this is, Nan,” the Mistress said, “She will be helping you around the house.”

The girl studied Arya with pursed lips. Some people, like the mistress, were born with faces that made people comfortable when they looked at them. Not so, Ora the maid who decided she didn’t like Arya at all. She sniffed, “She looks like she has fleas and smells even worse.” 

“Nan will be requiring a bath then,” Mistress Mott replied with an edge of irritation disguised under her steady voice. “Help her bathe.” The Mistress turned to Arya then. “I will go speak to the Master.” 

She clearly caught the start of dread in Arya. “Do not worry, child,” she said. “The smithy is his, the house is mine. Besides,” she whispered, “we really could do with the help. I will see you after your bath.” Then she was off. Arya watched her disappear around the corner and felt, for the first time in weeks, relief wash over her. She could sleep tonight without worrying someone would rob her in her sleep...or worse. 

They walked out of a rear door, across a narrow yard, and back to a cavernous stone barn. A blast of hot air punched Arya in the face. Ora dropped something off in the forge and walked back out. Arya followed her up a wooden staircase to the private quarters of the Motts. They’d just entered the kitchens when they were greeted by a waft that made Arya’s mouth water. The master cook, recognisable by his apron and his place by the oval stove built into the wall, was cooking some type of fish. Sausages hung from overhead rods. A woman was chopping vegetables on a long, narrow counter. The peaceable working between them made Arya think of Winterfell’s kitchens. They were ten times as large as the Motts’ but she couldn’t help but smile when she thought of Gage ordering people around as the cook here was doing to the woman. 

There were other people here too. Two young men sat at a table by the corner. Both clearly worked in the forge. Though they’d clearly made some effort to clean up, their clothes still sported soot. One got up and left. He nodded at Ora as he stepped out of the kitchens. That left the black-haired one. He was tall and... _big_ , Arya thought. He looked of an age with Robb and Jon but he was more muscly than both of them. Thoughts of them caused a pang in her heart. She gripped Needle again. It hung straight down her leg so no one could see it unless she lifted her cloak. _If Jon was here I wouldn’t feel so alone._

“This is the new maid,” Ora announced in a disapproving tone to the boy at the table. She looked Arya up and down. “As if a street urchin could be a maid. We’ll be lucky if she doesn’t rob us.” 

Arya glared at the back of the girl’s head but didn’t say a word. Even when she got to her hungriest, she hadn’t stolen. She made herself sick with raw pigeon rather than steal. She may have killed a boy, hurt a man, and lied to a kind woman, but she wasn’t a thief. 

“You don’t have anything she _could_ rob,” the boy said back. 

For some reason that made Arya smile. He looked at her then. He had deep blue eyes that reminded her of someone she couldn’t quite place.

Ora glared at him and moved away. The boy returned to his sausage and bread. The smell alone made Arya’s belly rumble loudly. The boy looked at her then and extended a piece of sausage ensconced in soft bread to her. “You can have more _after_ your bath.”

“Thank you,” Arya mumbled, cheeks full of the sausage. The juice ran down her chin. The burst of flavour after weeks of surviving on a mixture of raw and burnt pigeon, bowls of brown and mouldy bread almost made her knees weak.

The boy nodded and left the kitchens. 

Ora returned with four kettles. “Grab two and come along,” she ordered. “Let’s get you cleaned before you spread your fleas to the rest of us. We’ll bathe in the out-house, that way we'll not need to carry the buckets very far." They went down some stairs and out into a small garden full of metal implements. A brick out-house stood at the end. 

Ora began filling the first kettle from a nearby bay. “Master Mott likes all his servants to be clean, seeing as even royalty get their swords here,” she explained.

Arya stiffened. “Royalty?” 

“The old king’s brother Renly came here quite a few times. Served him myself, I did,” she said boastfully, “Him and the Knight of Flowers - handsome one that one. Any noble worth his salt comes ‘ere.” 

Arya knew both of them. Lord Renly had served on the King’s Council and Ser Loras had gifted Sansa a stupid rose. She wouldn’t shut up about it for days. 

“Do many people from the Red Keep come here?” She took off her cloak with Needle and put them in a corner. She didn’t want the girl to spot it when she bent down. 

“Oh yes. A few months ago, even the king’s own Hand came. The one they locked up for treason. I poured his wine myself.”

Arya bit her lip and lifted her own kettle to take to the vat. “What did he want?”

“It’s an armourer’s shop.” Ora rolled her eyes with exasperation. “What d’ye think he wanted?” She lit a fire and set her kettle on a hook above the fireplace. Arya did the same. “He wanted Gendry’s helm, the bull one. Gendry told him no o’course. Any other lord would’ve clouted him across the head for that but Gendry said Lord Stark only smiled and told the master if the boy wanted to wield a sword to send him to him. _‘Has the look of a warrior_ ’ he said.”

Arya blinked back the tears. 

It turned out that Lord Stannis, the king’s other brother had come here too as did her Aunt Lysa’s husband, Lord Jon Arryn, the one who’d fostered her father. “Don’t worry yerself wi’ all of that. Master Mott will not put just anyone in front of the great lords. Ye’ll work out back most like.” 

By the time the bath was full, Arya felt as if the wall of ice Ora had put up had somewhat thawed. She asked what brought Arya to King’s Landing and Arya lied through her teeth. Now she needed to remember the lies she told. 

Nan was the daughter of a free rider who’d served lords in the Riverlands. She had no other family and they never stayed in one place too long. She was travelling with her father when they had been attacked by outlaws in the Kingswood. She hid in the woods and ran to King’s Landing without a penny to her name. 

Ora in turn shared her story. She was of an age with Arya, although she looked older. She was born in this house. Her mother had served the Motts and when she’d died they kept her on. Her duties were that of a serving girl. She welcomed the lords to the shop whenever they arrived and to hear her tell it, she knew every sigil imaginable. 

"I’ll find ye a gown that will fit. Yer clothes aren’t even fit for the rag pile."

The moment the door closed, Arya pounced to where her discarded cloak was. Needle in hand, she looked around. The stone room was mostly bare. One end of it was used as a storage space of sorts. The rest of the furnishings in the room were a worn chest, a cupboard, the copper bath, a basin and rugs. Curtains covered the windows. There was nowhere she could hide Needle where it wouldn’t be found. 

Arya chewed her lip and paced. She’d need to hide Needle and quick. 

One of the stones rocked beneath her feet. Arya knelt and dug around its edges with her fingers. It would not move at first, but she persisted, picking at the crumbling mortar with her nails. Finally, the stone shifted. She grunted and got both hands in and pulled. A crack opened before her. “You’ll be safe here,” she told Needle. “No one will know where you are but me.” She pushed the sword and sheath behind the stone, then shoved it back into place, so it looked like all the other stones.

The door opened just as she stood. 

“Here ye are then.” Ora put down a brown woollen gown, snatched the cloak and demanded Arya hand over the rest of her clothes. “I’ll throw them in the furnace,” she informed Arya. “Ye’ll choke on the smoke if I do it here.”

Finally alone, Arya picked up a circle shaped piece of pink soap from a bowl hanging above the bath and sunk into the steaming water. She attacked her skin until the soap was just bigger than a copper coin and her skin pinker than the soap. Then she turned to her matted hair and scrubbed. It was the first bath she’d had in so long. 

Grabbing a linen cloth beside the bath, Arya forcefully dried her body, combed her hair, then braided it in the way Arianne and Tyene taught her, and donned the woolen dress Ora provided. She threw one look behind her shoulder to see the dead fleas floating in the bath. For a moment she felt sad for them. They had been her only companions since she fled the Red Keep. Still, her skin was grateful to see them gone, even with its angry red blotches. 

Next, she was introduced to the kitchen staff, Allun the cook and his wife Mari worked in the kitchens. Zekko the guard was no guard at all but the mistress’ nephew. He was also a smith who worked in the forge. There was Gendry , the apprentice who gave her his sausage earlier, Notch who’d just finished his apprenticeship, Orson and Pynto who were still apprenticing and Roland and Rolfe, two brothers who’d been working in the shop for nearly twenty years. 

Ora showed her around the kitchens telling her that sometimes she’d be required to help Allun and Mari. She was shown where the frying pans and saucepans were kept. Trivets and tongs hung off the walls. There was a small pantry out back so plentiful that it made Arya’s belly grumble. 

Fleas and cold looks forgotten, Ora chatted merrily to Arya as they sat down to eat. Arya feasted on a rack of honeyed ribs baked with garlic and herbs that made her want to cry. 

"On the good side, there is all the food ye can eat," Ora was saying. "'Tis a bit heavy in seasoning for my taste, but I'm not one for complaining." 

_Nor am I,_ Arya thought. 

She ate the ribs with spinach and turnips and even peas. In Winterfell, Arya _hated_ vegetables. She used to push hers on to Jon’s plate when her mother was not looking. Sometimes she gave him her tarts as thanks for ridding her of her enemy. Now, though, she ate them all without complaint, revelling in the taste. 

“We sleep on the second floor,” Ora told her. “Men to one side, me t'other. S’pose ye’ll be sharing with me. I shared with another girl before. Allun and Mari share a room. The Motts put up a wall between my room and where the men sleep to keep them chaste and me safe. Not that any of them would try anything, mind. Nor would I want any of them…’cept maybe Gendry. He’s the only one with a head on his shoulders. The rest are as thick as bricks. Once Gendry finishes his apprenticeship he might set up his own stall on the street. He’s a good one…” Ora went on talking. Arya only had eyes for her food. 

“Ah look at you,” Mistress Mott cooed and stood up from the table to walk toward Arya. 

She put an arm around Arya’s shoulder. “You only needed a bath! Tobho, this is Nan, the girl I told you about.”

Arya was bringing in their supper with Ora and Mari. 

The Master greeted her well. He wore a dark velvet coat with hammers embroidered on the sleeves in silver thread. Around his neck was a heavy silver chain and a sapphire as large as a pigeon’s egg. “Yna tells me you gave her back her purse.” 

“Just so,” the mistress said proudly. 

“Not many people in your position would have done the same,” Master Mott said. “Why didn’t you keep it for yourself?”

“My father always disapproved of stealing.” 

Master Mott smiled. “Where is he?” 

Arya retold the same story she told Ora earlier keeping everything as vague as she could. The Motts listened to her. 

Serving them over their supper, Arya learnt more about them. They had a grown daughter married and living in Pentos where the mistress was from. Arya learnt that Master Mott had left Qohor, traded in Pentos for a few years where he met the mistress, before moving to King’s Landing. 

Yawning, Arya lay down on the thick pallet in the room she’d be sharing with Ora. She knew she needed to go home. She would, but she could bide her time here until the gates were opened and she could make her escape. She’d have plenty of food and the mistress told her she’d be paid in a silver coin a month and have her other needs taken care of. Arya wondered how much she’d need to save for a ship’s fare north. 

Outside the moon was so full and round it seemed to devour the sky. Beside her, Ora snored softly. Arya closed her eyes and dreamt of Winterfell. She’d go home one day. She knew she would. When she did, she’d make sure the Motts were rewarded for their kindness. 

As Ora told her, her chores were limited to the house. Ora served out in the shop and the men mostly worked in the forge. The food at the Motts’ household was plentiful and her work simple enough. The mistress helped her husband in the shop sometimes but often stayed in her rooms reading or sewing. She talked a lot about missing her daughter and not getting used to the lonely life in King’s Landing even after twenty years. She loved her husband though, so she stayed. Something about her reminded Arya of her own mother who left Riverrun for Winterfell and made it her own because of her love for Father. 

Arya missed her mother with a gnawing pain but she dreaded seeing her again as well as the disappointment in her face if she ever learnt of what Arya had to do to get away from the Red Keep. She tried not to think of her too hard. Thoughts of her family always made her sad so she lost herself in her work, not that it kept the thoughts away. She thought of her father in the dungeons, of Sansa being held by strangers. She thought of her family in Winterfell and of Aegon and Princess Elia who suffered what she was suffering now. 

Arya made the Motts’ bed, shook out the rushes and cushions, and emptied chamber pots. She swept the floor and helped fill the water vat and the big iron kettles. She helped in the kitchens too and even ran errands for Mari and the mistress too. She drew up the hood of the cloak she was given and enjoyed getting to know the city without fear of being seen. She got to know the Street of Steel well. She could even recognise the marks of the biggest shops, and had a nodding acquaintance with the tailors on the Street of Silk. 

Whenever she had to leave, the mistress insisted someone went out with her. Sometimes it was Zekko the armourer, other times it was Mari. Often though, the mistress sent Gendry with her. He always did as he was told but grumbled under his breath about studying to be an armourer not a maid’s guard. 

The only thing that seemed to make the big boy happy was beating steel. There was something that drew the eye when he was bent over his table repairing or creating chain mail or hammering and shaping a broadsword on a smaller anvil. The hammer was like part of his arm. She watched the play of muscles in his chest and listened to the steel music he made. _He’s strong_ , she thought every time. Master Mott agreed. He said so often. 

Grumble as he might, he wasn’t horrible to her and sometimes, he saved her sweets when there were any in the kitchen. The apprentices and armourers tended to eat while she waited on the master, mistress and their nephew.

It’s what she was doing this night. Arya would stand beside the window waiting on them until they finished. There was a small, quiet street with small two story houses beside the house where some of the other armourers lived. She’d spend most of the time looking out of it.

“I was thinking…” the master said between the clinks of his cutlery. It was only he and his wife dining tonight.

“Hmm?”

“It might be good for you to stay with Talia in Pentos for a while. You’ll see your daughter again, hug your grandchildren, see your old father again.”

The mistress wiped her mouth and laid down her napkin. “Why?” she asked warily. 

“War is coming, Yna, and we’ll all feel it’s squeeze soon. The last time this city was sacked…” A shudder seemed to pass through the old master. “You were not here then either. It was a horror, _issa prūmia_.” 

He said soothing words to her in Valyrian that Arya didn’t quite understand. The mistress taught her small sentences some afternoons but not enough to follow this conversation. 

“The Targaryen boy has taken Dragonstone-“

Arya gasped. They both looked at her. “Sorry,” she said, almost sheepishly. “Someone nearly tripped on the street.” Excitement seemed to dance in Arya’s veins. There was only one Targaryen boy who’d take Dragonstone and it wasn’t Jon. _Does Jon know?_ she wondered. 

The Motts returned to their discussion.

“The Targaryen boy is calling himself king. He’ll set his sights on this city sooner or later and something tells me _sooner,”_ he raised his knife to make the point, “rather than later.” He sighed wearily as one carrying a heavy burden.

Arya sighed too. Unlike the master, hers was in relief. If Aegon took the city, she’d be safe. So would Sansa and her father. She tried to remain impassive but couldn’t fight the grin. After so long, she found a hope to hold on to. 

“The Westerlands’ strength is in the Riverlands and unlikely to return here any time soon if what I’ve been hearing is true.”

Mistress Mott shook her head in question. 

“The Hand’s son is riding south with a northern host to face Lord Tywin.”

“He’s fighting his father?”

“No,” Master Mott chuckled. “No _issa prūmia,_ the former Hand, Lord Stark. The one they’re holding for treason.”

 _Robb!_ Arya’s heart leapt in joy. Robb was coming. Robb would save her. She knew he would. Her brother would save her. Her brother would save them all. _Jon will be with him._ Arya could have cried with the glee of it all. 

“Nan, wine, please,” Mistress Mott said, absentmindedly. “I don’t see why that means _I_ have to go.”

Arya kept her hand steady as she poured. 

“Because, issa jorrāelagon,” the master explained, “the City Watch cannot protect the city when it falls and if it does...whoever the invading force is will not want to have mercy on a city held by Lannisters. They tried to kill the Targaryen boy and the Stark one will want to make them answer for his father and sisters. The younger one is thought dead-“ Master Mott pushed his plate away, a sign he was finished. 

The younger Stark girl, as he called her, moved to collect the plate.

“And the Imp is said to have killed his mother.”

The plate smashed against the floor. For a moment Arya lost control of her arms and even forgot how to breath. 

“I’m sorry,” she cried out, bending down to pick up the shards. “Pardon me, master. I’ll clean this up.” Her hands were shaking. 

“Are you alright, girl?” 

Arya knuckled the tears away. “Yes, master.” She picked up a broken shard. “I just don’t feel well.” 

Yna Mott hissed. “You’re bleeding, child!” she exclaimed. “No need to be so scared. It’s only a plate. You’ll clean it up.” 

Arya nodded. Everything turned into a blur and all the sounds dimmed. 

“What’s gotten into you?” Allun the cook asked her. She blinked. She couldn’t remember leaving the room. 

“I dropped a plate.” 

Allun looked at his wife in confusion. Mari stood up to take the tray from her. “It’s nothing to fuss over, Nan,” she said sweetly. “Come sit down. Let me take a look at that hand.” 

Arya bit her lip hard, heart-sick and in agony. Tears fell down her cheeks but the cook and his wife assumed it was from her injury. Ora walked in at some point and looked her over. 

“It’s only a plate, Nan,” she said like everyone else before sitting down for her supper. 

Arya ran out to the outhouse. She crouched and scratched at the mortar, shifting the stone, tears blinded her. Finally, she pulled the stone open, pulled out Needle and sobbed, holding it tight against her chest. Needle was all she had of home, of her family. Needle was Robb and Bran and Rickon, her mother and her father, even Sansa. Needle was Winterfell's grey walls, and the laughter of its people. Needle was the summer snows, Old Nan's stories, the heart tree with its red leaves and scary face, the warm earthy smell of the glass gardens, the sound of the north wind rattling the shutters of her room. Needle was Jon Snow's smile. She wished more than anything that Jon was here. 

Her mother was dead. She’d never see her again even if she did somehow manage to make it home. The tears burst out of her then like a broken dam, racing down her face. Her chin trembled with her grief and she struggled for air that wasn’t reaching her lungs. Her throat was on fire, her heart worse. Her mother was gone. She’d never see her again. 

The Lannisters took Lady and Mycah. They killed Hullen and Desmond and Syrio and now they killed her mother. _They have Sansa and Father. Will they kill them too?_

The door creaked open then and Arya jumped up, holding Needle behind her. 

“I thought the room was empty,” Gendry said almost apologetically. “I came here to wash up.” 

“Well it’s not,” Arya snapped. 

“What are you hiding there?” 

“N-nothing.” 

“It’s not nothing.” He marched up to her, she stepped back. Topless as he was, she could see all the muscles across his chest. He was ten times stronger than she was. 

Quick as a snake, Arya made to run but he caught the arm that held Needle and wrestled it out of her hand. 

“You stealing from the master?” 

“No!” she shouted. “I’m not! Give it back!” 

He took the thin sword out of it’s grey scabbard and held it against the fire to see better. “This is castle forged steel.” 

Arya angrily wiped her eyes. “So? My father served lords. He had this made for me.” 

“Why are you hiding it?” 

“Because people steal my things all the time! Give it back!” 

He did. “Have you been crying?” 

“No!” 

““What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“It doesn’t look like nothing.”

“Fine. I missed my mother,” she told him. 

“What happened to her?” 

“She died.”

“How?”

“She was killed,” Arya said in a clipped tone. “I don’t know how,” she added more softly. “I wasn’t there.” 

Gendry rubbed the back of his head and apologised. “I know how it feels,” he told her. “To lose your mother. I lost mine when I was little.” 

“What happened to her?” Arya asked. 

“She died,” he replied, echoing her. “All I remember is that she had yellow hair, and sometimes she used to sing to me.” Gendry told her she worked in an alehouse.

“The world will never be right again,” she thought, sliding down to sit on the floor. 

“It won’t,” Gendry replied. Only then did she realise she spoke out loud. “You’ll find a way to live with it though.” 

“Will you tell them? About Needle?”

Gendry looked at her with amusement in his eyes. “Needle?” 

She held it up. “It’s only little and it can’t harm anyone.” It could, Arya knew it could, but she needed the armourer’s apprentice to believe her. 

“Of course it can, why do you think the bravos use it?”

Jon told her about the bravos. She’d read about them too but Nan wouldn’t know about them. “What’s a bravos?”

“I won’t tell anyone about your sword,” he sighed instead. “Now, will you leave? I came here to wash.”

Arya stood then and nodded. “I need to do something first,” she said. “You need to leave.” 

He narrowed his eyes at her but left all the same. 

Once Needle was safely back behind its stone, Arya put a shovel and a bucket in front of the stone. 

Sleep eluded her when she returned to the room she shared with Ora. There was no point in sleeping, Arya thought. Gendry had probably told the Master about Needle. They’d throw her out for a thief soon. The moonlight cut its way through the small window casting dancing shadows across the wall.

Even with all that happened in her life since she escaped the Lannisters, Arya woke each morning secure in the knowledge that she would return home. Everything might change, the king could change, she could change and become a different person but important things, like her mother, would always stay the same. She told herself she would go home to Winterfell. Her mother would be waiting there. She’d gripe about all the unladylike things Arya had done but she would fold her in her arms and hold her tight. _Now she won’t._ Tears slid from beneath her closed eyelids, over the bridge of her nose, and onto the pillow. 

She was at the head of her pack, stalking through a wet wood with the smell of rain and men. They were dressed in the colour of blood, heaving up deep red wings with a golden lion on them. She knew those wings, had seen them back when she was with her girl. They’d hurt her girl. 

She stepped forward. Her cousins did the same. Quiet and swift, they ran out. The men scattered. She ran down one man with one of her cousins, tore his throat out and feasted. They filled their bellies on the group. And when the moon broke through the clouds, she threw back her head and howled. Two howls answered her in return but it was the silent one she heard the loudest. 

Arya woke. The grief sat heavy on her heart but with it blossomed strength. She hadn’t dreamt of Nymeria ever since she ran her off. She giggled. Nymeria was alive. Nymeria had her own pack. _Nymeria killed Lannisters._ Arya could be as strong as her wolf. 

Rising, she crossed to the basin of cold water, washed and then dressed for the day. She couldn’t bring her mother back but she could make the Lannisters pay with Robb and Jon. 

“You will be coming with me,” the mistress was saying as Arya rinsed out her hair. “The ship leaves in ten days. Ora will come too. I won’t leave the girl to these rapers if they take the city.”

“Will we come back?” Arya twisted the water out of her hair and began to towel. 

“Of course,” Yna Mott laughed. “I don’t see why we should go but he insists.” She stepped out of the bath and wrapped her linen cloth around her. “Besides, I have missed my Talía.”

Arya smiled. Her main concern was to get out of King’s Landing. It didn’t matter where she went. She’d find her way back home. The only reason she was still here was because she couldn’t leave the city alone. _No one’s looking for an armourer’s wife’s maid._

“Nan,” Ora said, later when Arya was throwing the water out. “Master Mott says ye’ll have to serve out front today. I don’t feel well.”

Arya put a hand to the girl’s head. “You don’t have a fever.”

“It’s not my head. It’s my belly! Now go out front. I’ll save ye double-portions for supper.”

Gendry was fixing chain mail in the shop. 

“Rising up in the world?” His blue eyes danced. 

“Ora is sick. Master asked me to help here.” Arya sat up beside the bench where he was working. 

Gendry kept his promise to her. He hadn’t told anyone about Needle and he hadn’t touched it either. She’d checked to see. 

He showed her the helmet her father wanted to see too. It was perfectly formed but Arya didn’t understand why her father would want a helmet in the image of a bull. His sigil was a direwolf. 

She let her gaze travel the length of Gendry’s strong chest where his shirt sat tight across firm muscles. Neither his shirt nor his apron could hide the broad shoulders, muscled arms and strong legs that made him taller than the other armourers in the shop. 

Every now and then he’d move his hair out from his eyes. 

“You should tie it back,” Arya told him. “Then it won’t keep bothering you.”

The door opened. The bell clinked. 

“You have to go welcome them,” Gendry instructed. “Ora knows all the sigils but if you don’t know theirs just ask them to sit down. Tell them you’ll get the master.” He took the chain mail and left. 

“Get me a cup of wine and call your master,” a voice said impatiently. Arya turned round to face him and froze. 

The master’s new customers were none other than the Redwyne twins, Ser Horas and Ser Hobber. Arya had seen them at court a hundred times. Sansa and Jeyne Poole used to call them Ser Horror and Ser Slobber, and giggle whenever they caught sight of them. Arya was not giggling now. She couldn’t even breathe. 

“Are you hard of hearing?” Ser Horror asked.

“No, my lord. I’ll get you your wine...and the master,” she added hastily. She turned slowly, putting one foot in front of the other, all the while wanting to run. 

She returned with the wine and the master. 

Master Mott spoke about having the best the Arbor has to offer to “remind them of home.” Arya poured each of the twins a cup and extended some to their three retainers. Then she left, almost in a run for the upper house. They didn’t recognise her but she wasn’t about to stick around until they did. 

She started cleaning Ora wasn’t going to do so. _It’s not her duty. Yours is up here and hers out there._

Once she finished, she went out back to fill the water vat. She was in the garden heaving water when she saw a man walk out to the forge with the master. He was stout and round shouldered, almost as tall as Master Mott but not quite. He wore a rich cloak of heavy purple velvet with silver thread. His face was hooded but a gust of wind gushed forth and blew the hood back. He had a small brown beard, almost reddish. He looked so familiar…

 _Look with your eyes,_ she heard Syrio whisper. 

Arya felt the blood drain out of her body. It was the eunuch, Varys. _From the king’s council._ Sansa said eunuchs couldn’t grow beards but Arya was sure it was him. She turned on her heels and stepped into the shadows behind the forge. The moment he walked in, she ran out and dashed up the stairs to the kitchens. They had knives there. She’d use them if she had to. Even her father couldn’t blame her for trying to run away from the queen’s minions. Not when Robb was fighting them too. Besides, she probably couldn’t escape. Not with the Redwyne twins still out front. 

Mari asked her to help chop the onions since she wasn’t doing anything. 

She saw the hooded king’s councillor leave the forge. Gendry was with him, bull’s helmet in hand. _Where’s he taking him?_ Panic gripped her throat. 

She ran out of the kitchens to the mistress’ chambers. She was out with Zekko. Arya threw open the curtains and saw Gendry turn right with the eunuch. She left that room for the solar where the Motts took supper. They’d turned into the small quiet street. Gendry walked beside the eunuch. Neither spoke. She was just about to step away when she saw the Redwyne twins step in. Suddenly, three cloaked figures fell upon their guards and two black cloaked men pulled the twins into darkness covering their mouths. It made them faint. One of the men looked up and Arya threw herself on the floor, heart hammering. 

_What did the Spider want with Gendry and why was he dressed like that? Why were the Redwyne twins attacked outside the shop?_

When Arya asked about Gendry at supper, Master Mott said the lord who paid for his apprenticeship demanded his service. No one spoke of what befell the Redwyne twins. Not even the Gold Cloaks. When Arya looked out of the window earlier that afternoon, even their bodies were gone. 

Everyone was asleep when Arya tip-toed down to the out-house and retrieved Needle. She couldn’t stay with the Motts any longer. She had been stupid. So stupid. She needed to leave this city. She needed to find her family or even Aegon and Arianne. More importantly, she needed not to get caught. Arya snuck into the men’s room and stole for the first time in her life. She took Pynto’s clean breeches. They were a little large but she tied them and put her woolen gown in a bundle with the two other shifts the mistress had gifted her. She took some sausages too. Some day she’d pay them all back and more. She’d make sure her father bought Pynto ten breeches in return. 

That night, Arya Stark returned to her old alcove above the only smithy in Flea Bottom and lay down. She’d miss the kind Motts and their household with its abundant food. Varys’ visit had taught her there were no safe places in King’s Landing but at least no one would be looking for her here. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before I started writing this chapter, Arya and Gendry met on the streets. But as I started writing, there was nothing in Gendry’s mind-my-own-business attitude that told me he’d develop a friendship over a matter of weeks with a random girl off the streets. Perhaps they could befriend each other but I thought it would be much easier if they had to live in the same house lol. Plus, in the Motts’ household Arya got to learn news about Cat and she sees things that should clue you in on happenings outside her arc. Plus, she deserved to have a break from the craziness of Flea Bottom. 
> 
> In the books, Arya’s chapter in Flea Bottom is full of rumours. She hears all sorts about how Robert came to die and I thought here we could play here with how rumours are carried. As readers we know that Cat died at the hands of Vale mountain clans. All the highborn characters know that too. Chances are Tobho hears it from other traders and like with much hear-say the story takes on a different form even if the essence (Cat being dead here and Robert being dead in the books) stays the same. 
> 
> I wanted to keep Arya safe in the Motts’ household and off in Pentos with the mistress but there was nothing in Arya’s character that told me she’d stay in that house after Varys came and took Gendry. After seeing the Redwyne Twins being yeeted outta there in the side street she’d be on edge anyway. So our girl is back to fending for herself. :( Unfortunately, she didn’t know Varys just broke her father out of prison. What did Jon say about her and hiding again? lol. Varys is great at his job but in a city of half a million people, I’m not sure he’d be expecting the Great Lord Stark’s daughter to be working as a maid in an armourer’s household. 
> 
> Arya crushing on Gendry is canon. I couldn’t not include it. Yes, I giggled when I wrote the line about Gendry giving her his sausage looool. What can I say? I have a childish sense of humour lol. She should totally get her chance to fancy Gendry. Jon was stealing kisses during his time in Deepwood Motte. 
> 
> Arya doesn’t go to Braavos but of course she’d hide Needle somewhere so I used that from the canon text as well. After hearing of Cat’s death though, I can imagine her turning to Needle because she’s lost everything that made her Arya of House Stark. If she’s not grieving her mother as much as her brothers, I assure you it’s not because she loves Cat any less. The poor girl is just trying to make it in a crazy world. 
> 
> Next chapter, the northern host tries to cross the Trident and have to come to terms with an old man who has too many kids. Then, we come back to King’s Landing to visit our competent queen whose only fault is that she is surrounded by idiots. That’s right, it’s the one, the only, the Light of the West, Cersei of the House Lannister, Tywin Reborn lmao.


	43. Jon

**Jon**

Finally past The Neck, they made camp halfway between the kingsroad and the Green Fork of The Trident. Jon was exhausted. His joints ached after the long days spent astride and his head felt worse. 

He soaked his kerchief in a bucket of water and used it to wipe his face then his neck. Cooling trickles ran down his back. It was the only relief he’d find tonight. He had no hope of sleep. None of them should, given all Ghost had shown him. 

Just one year ago Jon would have sworn skinchangers and wargs belonged in Old Nan’s stories, not in the world he had lived in all his life. Mere months ago, he would’ve sworn he was in the first throes of madness. Weeks ago, he’d have linked that madness to the mad man who’d sired the man who sired him. 

Now, seeing what he had, he knew the truth of the trial - _the gift_ Bran preferred to call it - the chroniclers spoke of. As did his brothers. Bran accepted his link with Summer early on. Rickon too. While Jon thought himself turning as mad as his newfound grandfather, Robb struggled secretly with the same fear. Bran, with no one but Old Nan as a constant companion for weeks on end, not only accepted it, but mastered his link with his wolf. That was something Jon and Robb were just learning to do, secretly. _Beastling,_ was a word bandied about of wargs. It was not something to have spread while marching for war. 

He couldn’t help but wonder if Arya and Sansa had similar links with their wolves. Sansa’s had died when little more than a puppy, and Arya’s was lost to her. _How she’d have protected you from them, little sister._ The wolf had saved her before. She could have done so again had they not made her run her off. 

Jon finished his ablutions and joined a small group beside the fire. News of what he already knew and told Robb would arrive soon. _Better to broach it with the lords then. Might as well manage a few morsels first._ Robb would be dining with Lord Tallhart tonight so Jon joined the first circle he came across. Smalljon Umber made space for him to sit with them. The Greatjon’s heir had proven an amenable companion on the march. With him were Robin Flint, Torrhen and Eddard Karstark, Donnel Locke and Owen Norrey. Donnel passed him a skin of ale and some roasted meat. At first there was little talk, everyone concentrated on the food. At least it wasn’t raining. Spring rains beleaguered them nearly every day of their march. Tonight they could see the stars with nary a cloud. Jon kept his eyes on the edge of the camp. It was a long while before Theon rode into view. 

The Blackfish had taken a hundred men and a hundred swift horses and raced ahead to screen their movements and scout the way. Theon had been one of them. The Blackfish, keen to keep Jon away from any position of influence, had asked for _him_ to join the scouting party. 

The whole march south, the man had taken issue with everything Jon said, did or _didn't_ do for that matter. His hawk-eyes, so reminiscent of Catelyn Stark’s, followed him always, scowling, waiting for the most minute whiff of treason. 

The days when Jon might cower from such a gaze felt like centuries ago. Arya was lost. Perhaps he’d never see her grin again, or hear her laugh, or muss her hair. The only father he ever knew was in chains. Sansa was held by the same people who’d tried to kill Bran. And Jon Snow’s life had been a lie. He had a brother he scarcely knew and, if Ser Gerold was to be believed, meant something to people he’d never met. People he’d only ever heard about in stories. People who held him to be something he had neither the time nor the will to come to terms with against the deluge of shit that was now his life. Against all that, the futile fumings of an old fool were of no significance. _If words are wind, what are looks?_

Jon returned each one of the Blackfish’s cold looks. He didn’t particularly like the man either. Then he waited for him to do something, say something. He never did. 

Instead, he’d whisper in Robb’s ear, telling him to send Jon on some task that would keep him away from the vanguard. Robb declined saying he needed Jon beside him for this first part of the march. They were still learning to see through the wolves’ eyes and on alternate nights, they’d send their wolves out to scout ahead, honing their skills, and sharing what they’d learnt. The old, quiet, wolf joined them too but they never knew what he did or saw unless Ghost or Grey Wind joined him. He went further than they ever did and stayed away longer but he always came back. Just as he did tonight. Before he entered the tent, Jon threw him a rack of uncooked lamb.

Theon told the assembled lords that Lord Tywin’s host was still many days to the south, burning lands as he passed … but Walder Frey, the man they’d been counting on, had assembled a force of near four thousand men at his castles on the Green Fork. 

Jon told Robb as much. He’d seen the Frey host milling about between the two castles through Ghost’s eyes. 

“Coward,” Ser Gerold muttered. 

The Riverlands were split. Those who stood loyal to House Targaryen in the last war were being organised in secret. Even now, some of Aegon’s men were melting into the garrisons of the riverlords who pledged their cause to the House of the Dragon. Other lords would let Tywin come upon their empty castles and holdfasts feigning flight. 

_”Let him think people fear his Rains of Castamere,”_ the princess said. 

Aegon had already made his first move. They’d had word that Tywin had taken Harrenhal. Saying she didn’t have the men to hold it, The Lady Shella yielded it to him with all its staff in return for her life. She’d already sent most of her fighting men to Pinkmaiden. Others stayed in the castle as stable hands, cooks, armourers, grooms, waiting.

When Tywin left a lightly garrisoned castle to face the northern host, they’d take the castle back with the full strength of Aegon’s army, cutting Tywin’s retreat and his lines of communication from the rear just as The Blackfish was doing here. 

“ _And when he thinks himself safe, leading from the back, that’s when Arthur will strike,”_ Ser Gerold said. Were the lives of people he cared about not at stake, Jon would think the whole thing - getting to know Ser Gerold, seeing the Sword of the Morning and the Black Bat in battle - an adventure beyond his wildest dreams.

Other riverlords, unaware of these plans, answered the call to join the Tully host at Riverrun. 

Every house had chosen a side, openly or not. All but Walder Frey, Lord of The Crossing, who kept his four thousand swords around him. 

“Four thousand men,” Robb repeated, sitting at the head of the table. All the major northern lords were present in the pavilion. The two princesses, Prince Trystane and the Lady Shireen joined too. “Lord Frey cannot hope to fight the Lannisters by himself. Surely, he means to join his power to ours.”

“Or he means to join the Lannisters,” Elia replied. “His son is married to Tywin’s sister. Four thousand men behind walls is plenty enough to prevent our crossing. Rightly or wrongly, there’s no reason for him to believe we stand a chance against Tywin.”

“If I were him, I’d be expecting a reward for that,” Lord Bolton finished for her in his soft, hushed voice. 

“What have the Freys been doing while the Lannisters burn their fields and plunder their holdfasts?” 

“There’s been some fighting between Ser Addam’s men and Lord Walder’s,” Theon answered. “Not a day’s ride from here, we found two Lannister scouts feeding the crows where the Freys had strung them up. Most of Lord Walder’s strength remains massed at the Twins, though.”

“If he’s been fighting the Lannisters, perhaps he does mean to hold to his vows,” Robb said. 

Lord Glover was less encouraged. “Defending his own lands is one thing, open battle against Tywin Lannister quite another.”

“Ser Brynden also says to tell you he’s crossed swords with the Lannisters,” Theon went on. “There are a dozen scouts who won’t be reporting back to Lord Tywin anytime soon. Or ever.” He grinned. Then he leaned forward. “More interestingly though, the last scout to die told us their outriders have been plagued by a pack of wolves. Every time they break to rest, they’re being picked off.” 

Jon and Robb looked at each other. They’d learnt over the years to speak without speaking at all. _It wasn’t me,_ Robb seemed to say. 

_Nor I_ , Jon replied. _His_ curiosity only took him as far as The Twins and he’d not encountered any Lannisters across the way. 

While the Grey hunted ahead of them sometimes, he didn’t spend long enough away from them to pick off Lannister men south of The Twins and beyond his sons most certainly hadn’t a pack just yet.

“Last they heard Ser Addam only had a handful of quickly tiring men left. He knows where we are, more or less, but the Blackfish vows he will not know when we split. Our bowmen are shooting down any raven they see leaving the battlements.” 

Robb eyed the map. “Has he found any other way across the Green Fork?” 

Theon shook his head. “The river’s running high and fast. Ser Brynden says it can’t be forded, not this far north.”

“I must have that crossing!” Robb declared, fuming. “Our horses might be able to swim the river, I suppose, but not with armored men on their backs. We’d need to build rafts to pole our steel across, helms and mail and lances, and we don’t have the trees for that-”

 _Or the time,_ Jon thought. Robb echoed his thoughts. “Lord Tywin is marching north …” He balled his hand into a fist.

“Lord Frey would be a fool to try to bar our way,” Theon Greyjoy said with his customary confidence. “We have nine times his number. You can take the Twins if you need to, Robb.”

“We’d lose more men than he would,” Jon told him. “We’d have to split our host, besiege two castles, deal with archers at every arrow slit and pikemen on the ground. His gates are closed and barred-” 

“How do _you_ know that?” Theon asked, voice thick with suspicion. 

_Ghost. “_ Any man with four thousand swords he’s keeping around him would do the same. Besides,” Jon added, “It’s all moot. Tywin Lannister would get here before we began the siege-” 

“And catch us with our breeches down,” The Greatjon concluded. 

They needed to strike hard and fast before the Kingslayer could return to help his child-killing father. Everyone around the table knew that too. 

Robb rubbed his hands over his face. “I must have that crossing,” he said in a tired, low voice. 

Unable to find a solution, everyone retired for the night. Everyone but the three of them. 

"Pour us some wine, Theon.” Robb motioned to a small oak folding table upon which sat a tray and goblets. “My throat feels dry." 

On any other day, Theon would have asked when he became a cupbearer but even he understood that sometimes, like this one, silence was golden. So he poured. 

The darkest parts of Jon had once envied Robb his position as Lord Eddard’s heir. Winterfell would be his one day. He’d sit in his father’s seat, command his respect, speak with his voice and rule the biggest kingdom in Westeros. Yet as he watched him weighed down by the burden of Eddard Stark’s mantle, he felt nothing but anguish for not being able to relieve his burdens. Instead of being home at Winterfell with his new wife in the early days of her pregnancy, Robb Stark was at war, responsible for the lives of the thirty five thousand men who followed him south. 

Theon handed each of them a goblet and took the seat across from Jon. 

Jon waited for Robb to speak. Sooner or later, he would address the issue at hand. When he could no longer avoid it. _Not that talking will make any difference,_ he thought. They _had_ to have The Twins. Even if they marched south without Frey’s men… _What’s to say they won’t hit us from the rear?_ Striking Tywin Lannister head on was a gamble, one he prayed they wouldn’t have to make. 

Just as Aegon’s plans hung on Tywin coming north, so too did the fate of Riverrun. When the Lord of Lannister marched north to engage their host, Robb would hurry the cavalry down the West Bank of The Trident to route Jaime Lannister with the strength of Seagard behind him. In doing so, he’d put a river between the Kingslayer and his father. Lord Glover would lead the northern foot to face him. 

When Robb made his decision known, Lord Karstark grumbled about Ethan Glover’s conflicted interests, ‘ _what with being the dragon boy’s new father,”_ he said. Lord Bolton once again demanded he be granted command instead. It took Robb reminding them that Aegon was an ally not an enemy and the enduring trust Ned Stark had in Lord Glover to douse the fire the suggestion created.

“When my father saw war on the horizon he sent word ahead to Lord Glover, the man he trusted most in the world, to protect Princess Elia and Rhaegar’s son from Tywin Lannister,” he told them. “Lord Glover is my father’s man first and it is my decree that he lead the foot south when we split.”

Splitting however, hung solely on the whims of the Lord of the Crossing. 

As if they needed any reminder on their dire straits, The Blackfish himself rode back to them with the dawn. His face was grave when he entered the pavilion. “There has been a battle under the walls of Riverrun,” he said, his mouth grim. “We had it from a Lannister outrider we took captive. The Kingslayer has destroyed Edmure’s host and sent the lords of the Trident reeling in flight.” 

Ser Edmure Tully was wounded and taken prisoner and the other survivors under siege inside Riverrun, surrounded by the Lannister host. 

Having not slept at all, Robb looked exhausted and with it irritable. “We must get across this accursed river if we’re to have any hope of relieving them in time.” 

“That will not be easily done,” the Blackfish cautioned. “Lord Frey has pulled his whole strength back inside his castles, and his gates are closed and barred.” 

“Damn the man,” Robb swore. “What must we do to get the crossing?” 

“Pay his toll. He’ll squeeze you for all he can...and even then, he might choose to cripple you anyway. Had he a shred of honour he’d have answered Hoster’s call.” 

Robb inhaled, held his breath and expelled it slowly, long and drawn. “Let us march to these twins,” he said and marched out. “My horse!” Jon heard him shout. 

The vanguard followed the Kingsroad south, coming upon The Twins just short of midday. Ghost had reunited with him just before they arrived. 

The river ran fast and deep here. With no other crossing, it became clear just how the Freys grew so rich. Just as Jon had seen, spears and swords protruded from the battlements with archers at every arrow slit and murder hole.

 _I told you,_ Jon said with a look. Robb only closed his eyes. A clamor broke out in their ranks as each lord saw with his own eyes the truth Jon had told them the night before. The Greatjon cursed, Ser Gerold whispered in Princess Elia’s ear, Lord Karstark eyed the castle as if a look could bring it down, Roose Bolton stated the obvious. The reactions differed. The conclusion was the same. _We cannot take this castle._

The bridge dropped down then, and a dozen knights rode out to confront them. They were led, they learnt, by Lord Frey’s heir, Ser Stevron. Of an age with Ser Gerold, when compared to The White Bull, he looked a furrowed weasel, rheumy-eyed and wrinkled beyond his years. Even so, he greeted them politely. “My lord father has sent me to greet you, and inquire as to who leads this mighty host,” he said, not taking his eyes off Ser Gerold. After a momentary start of shock, he’d managed to control his face. His eyes though seemed unable to accept what was in front of him. 

“I do.” Robb spurred his horse forward. He was in his armor, with the direwolf shield of Winterfell strapped to his saddle. Grey Wind padded by his side, but the Great Grey walked ahead of him. 

Any amusement in the old knights face disappeared the moment he saw the wolves. His horse whickered uneasily at their approach. 

“My lord father would be most honoured if you would share meat and mead with him in the castle and explain your purpose here.” 

“Walder Frey cannot be trusted,” Lord Glover said. “If anyone must go, let me. Stay here, wait for my return.”

Cursing, shouting, pointing fervently, every northern lord said words of a similar vein. 

Roose Bolton all but whispered, “Go in there alone and you’re his. He can sell you to the Lannisters, throw you in a dungeon, or slit your throat, as he likes.” 

“If he wants to talk to us, let him open his gates, and we will all share his meat and mead,” declared Robb’s good uncle. 

“Or let him come out and treat with Robb here, in plain sight of his men and ours,” suggested his good father.

With every word, the Freys’ offence grew.

“I will go,” Robb said forcefully. “Lord Walder has extended an invitation in goodwill to me. I mean to answer it.”

“You can’t!” The Greatjon shouted. 

“Who is to lead us if you do?” Lady Mormont inquired. 

The uproar grew. The Grey crouched backwards, ears erect, lips curled, teeth bared and snarled. Grey Wind did the same, barking out at the crowd. The shouting dimmed to a buzz. 

Robb fished into the arm hole of his armour and pulled out a scroll. “Should I come to any harm, I leave with you my last orders.” 

The buzz died. 

“Lord Bolton,” Robb said. The Leech Lord rode forward. Jon held his breath. _Don’t._ Princess Elia, face etched in dread, seemed to think the same. 

“To whom did you pledge the faith of The Dreadfort?”

“To Winterfell.”

“And you, Lord Dustin?”

The Lord of Barrowton gripped the reins of his fine red stallion and answered resolutely. 

One by one, Robb asked the same question of each northern lord. The answer was the same each time. 

Robb handed the scroll to Jon and spoke the words as Jon read the text. _No._ He grabbed Robb’s arm. 

“I am not the only son of Winterfell here,” he said, unperturbed. “Should I not return by sunset, command falls to Jon until my father’s return.” Robb moved away and Jon’s arm fell limp by his side.

“You cannot mean-“ The Blackfish protested, shooting daggers at Jon with his eyes. Jon himself did not have the words to say the same thing. “...To leave a bastard in charge of your army.”

“What’s it to you then?” The Greatjon asked. “He’s Ned Stark’s own blood who else would lead the host? You?” 

“The north is sworn to Winterfell,” Robb answered his uncle. “Should I fail to return, with Bran so far to the north, Jon _is_ Winterfell and time is of the essence. Wouldn’t you agree?” 

Robb turned his horse then and strode forward. “As your liege lord’s brother, Ser Brynden will be joining me,” he told the heir to The Twins. “I presume your lord father will not turn away a son of Riverrun.”

Ser Stevron looked taken aback by the forcefulness in Robb’s voice. “No,” he breathed. “I am certain my lord father would be pleased to speak to Ser Brynden as well. To vouchsafe for our good intentions, my brother Ser Perwyn will remain here until your safe return.”

“He shall be our honored guest,” said Robb. Ser Perwyn, the youngest of the Freys in the party, dismounted and handed the reins of his horse to a brother. 

Old Martyn strode forward and walked the Frey back to camp. 

“Lead the way,” Robb instructed Stevron Frey.

Unsurely, he obeyed. 

The northern lords each shouted after the Frey party with threats of what would befall Walder Frey if Robb was not returned to them. 

Jon found his voice at that very moment. “Robb,” he called out. “Wait!” When he reached him, “Why?” he asked.

“It’s what father would have done.” Jon knew as much. Ned Stark had always led from the front. Never had he asked of his men to do or risk what he would not. 

“Why me? I meant. You could’ve chosen Lord Glover or the Greatjon or-“

Robb smiled a smile which seemed to belie the dread that fell over their entire host. “Are you not my brother?”

Jon felt tears begin to burn in his eyes and gulped, lump in throat. “Come back.” 

“Don’t get too comfortable,” Robb chuckled. “I don’t have any choice but to do so. Elsewise Wylla will pull me back by my balls from the seven hells.”

“You better, Stark,” Jon chuckled tearfully, grasping his arm. “She’ll kill me for letting you go.”

“Take care, brother,” Robb replied, clenching his teeth. “It would not do to cry in front of these men.”

As he watched Robb disappear into the castle, even as he held Robb’s letter in his hand, Aegon’s seemed to burn his thighs from where it was in his saddle bag. _Brother._ Two men - one he’d known since he knew what it was to know and another he shared nothing with but the blood of a father - called him that word. 

Arianne had come north with a letter from the brother he’d just found. 

_I had always wished we could speak when you came to know what we were to each other,_ Aegon wrote. 

_You have grown up surrounded by brothers. I have never had any but you. As a child, I looked forward to the day I’d come to the Iron Throne. Not because I cared for the power it would give me or the prestige - I grew up in the remote hills of Norvos with little in the way of courtly luxury. I looked forward to it because it was my only chance to live freely, to call my mother, mother and not aunt and to one day call you brother._

While Jon had grown up without any idea that a different life or identity might exist for him, the boy born to be king was raised to love kin anyone in his position should hate. Had Rhaegar and Lyanna not done what they did, no matter what Elia would have Jon believe, Aegon would not have suffered what he had. Nor would Elia or Rhaenys, the sister he’d never known. And yet separated as mother and son were, suffer as they did, they spoke to him of family and of their ties of kinship. Had Jon not known Princess Elia his whole life, he’d assume it all an act, some courtly game but it wasn’t. Not to her. _Child of my heart_ , she’d called him. She’d protected him for seventeen years and her son had called him brother. If Jon knew the value of a word, it was that one. He’d die for his own. And for Princess Elia, he had a duty to her son. 

So he waited where he stood for one man who called him brother to save his own cause and the other’s.

As the sun rose higher, and the shadows lengthened into the afternoon, Jon sent Ghost across the river to the other bank of The Crossing.

One by one, men retired for some rest. 

Arianne and her party stayed beside him for a time. 

“If my father had sent me here,” she said, “you wouldn’t have to beg the man to cross.”

“Regret, already?” Jon asked her. 

“Never,” she said. “I would hate my life but the war would be won.” _Aegon would be king._

All Jon knew of family were the siblings he grew up with in Winterfell, the man he called father and an uncle he seldom saw. The Martells, many as they were, and dispersed as they were, were a single unit with a single voice and single-minded determination to crown the boy born to be their king. 

In the end, even Arianne left to retire and Jon was left alone. 

It was late afternoon when they next saw movement come from the direction of The Twins. 

Lord Glover, his two brothers, Smalljon Umber and his father and Theo Wull all walked over. 

Ser Stevron Frey was riding in the company of more Freys across the bridge. _Where’s Robb?_ By the time Stevron Frey reached them, the northern lords were clambering with questions about Robb’s whereabouts. 

“My lord father sent me out to share his apologies,” he started, trying to make himself heard.

“Where is my good son, Frey?” Ser Wylis asked. “We gave your father until evenfall.”

“Then you would know, Ser…”

“Wylis. Manderly.”

“Ser Wylis, we have at least another two hours until then.”

“Why are you here then?” the Greatjon barked. 

“As I was saying, my lord. My father sent me with his apologies. He was unaware that the two princesses of Dorne were in your company and would be remiss in not extending his hospitality to them. My father welcomes them _and_ Ser Gerold Hightower to join him.”

“Tell your lord father, the princess thanks him but will have to decline his invitation,” Lord Glover answered for his wife. “She is weary of the road and resting.” 

“My lord, if you please, I was asked to extend my invitation to the princess directly.”

“And I am answering you as her lord husband.” The Glover lord’s brown eyes were hard, unrelenting, as they bore into the Frey. 

“My lord,” Ser Stevron tried persuasively, “Three of my brothers would remain with you until their safe return.”

“Your lord father could give me every one of his heirs and I still would not send my wife or niece into that castle. Please tell Lord Frey, he is welcome to send any messages he has for the princess here. He is also welcome to come out here himself. We would _all_ like to meet him.”

“Aye!”

“We would!”

“Ethan.” Robbett Glover gripped his brother's sleeve. Lord Glover only continued to stare down the Frey lord. 

He shifted uncomfortably in his saddle.“My lord, your liege lord trusted my father.”

“My liege lord is in King’s Landing and Robb is still not here. Return to your father, Ser Stevron. Tell him he’ll have no more hostages from us and that the princess will hear his words from where she is. And remember, we only have peace until evenfall or Robb’s return.” Then he walked away. 

“Have you lost your mind, man?” Ser Wylis asked him. “Robb is in there alone.”

“I didn’t particularly enjoy sending him alone either,” Lord Glover answered. “But I will not give Walder Frey three other hostages.”

“Do you think your wife more important-“

“More important than who?” Princess Elia asked, joining the circle of lords.

When she was told the source of the conflict, she sighed. “He’ll be back,” she said. “Walder Frey will not miss the opportunity to secure his position should we win.”

She was right. Once more the old heir to The Twins rode down the small plank bridge across The Moat. He looked too tired of it all, Jon thought. The man was polite enough, agreeable even one might say. _Were he the Lord of the Crossing, we might have had better luck._ Unfortunately for them, they had to deal with his father - a man no one had anything good to say about. 

“Princess,” he said, bowing his head, “It is good to look upon you again. It has been so long. My father had hoped to see you too but that was refused.” Though he looked pleasant enough, his comment was pointed. Lord Glover was unfazed, close to his wife’s side. Whatever ice had formed between the two of them before they left Deepwood Motte had thawed somewhat in the journey south. 

“My apologies, Ser Stevron,” the princess said, “I have grown road weary and chose the wrong moment to rest. What would my Lord Frey ask of me?”

“My father says you will understand his difficult position. He is being asked to choose between his loyalty to the Iron Throne and his duty to his liege lord. Lord Stark’s son has impressed upon him the justness of his war. Yet Lord Tywin tells us he is responding to a slight upon his house, the old king’s brother by marriage and the new one’s own uncle. How, my father says, is an old man to choose between two just causes? He had hoped, by speaking to you, to learn more about other news we have heard - news that having seen Ser Gerold myself, I am inclined to believe - about the return of Prince Aegon and his claim to the Iron Throne.”

The princess listened patiently to the rheumy eyed knight as he talked and talked and talked. Walder Frey’s toll was simple. Should he let them cross, he wanted a seat on Aegon’s council for himself and his sons after him. He also wanted two of his grandsons to be taken on as Aegon’s wards when he came to the throne as well as Princess Arianne’s hand in marriage for one of his sons.

_If he has the gall to ask this of Elia, what is he asking of Robb?_

“Your lord father’s concerns are well founded, ser,” Elia said when he was finished. “No lord would wish for such a conflict. However, seeing as Cersei Lannister’s bastard has no claim to the throne, I do not see quite what the contention is between Lord Walder’s loyalty to the Iron Throne and his duty to Lord Hoster.”

“Some would say that claim is one you make to add legitimacy to your son’s cause,” said a tall grey haired Frey with a beard was thin as a rat’s tail.

“Ser Aenys,” she smiled. “My son was born for that throne and we have witnesses of the veracity of those words. News that has gladdened us all has just arrived. The king’s men in King’s Landing have freed Lord Eddard Stark, Robert’s own Hand arrested in an attempt to silence him.”

Jon tried to keep his own face impassive but more than one lord gave Princess Elia an incredulous look. The Frey's, caught in their own shock, only shot each other startled looks.

“Why would Lord Stark have any cause to support my son over his own king’s son?”

Aenys Frey’s watery eyes had the courtesy to lower themselves from the princess’ challenging gaze. 

“How did that come to be, princess,” asked Ser Stevron. “We’d heard Lord Stark was in the black cells.”

“What matters, ser, is that he _is_ free.”

“What proof do you have?” rejoined Ser Aenys.

“My word. It is all you’ll get at this moment. Perhaps a few more facts will help paint the picture for you however. King’s Landing has no protection from the sea while my son has both his own fleet and the royal one Lord Stannis withdrew to Dragonstone. With her father’s forces engaged here, Cersei Lannister has only the most pitiful protections in the south.”

“Giving us crossing here will allow the northern host to relieve Riverrun, your own liege lord’s castle. I must say, I do sympathise with your father’s position. To have Riverrun fall before he could send out his men…” She sighed sadly as if Walder Frey would care about that. 

“But all is not lost,” the princess continued. “The northern host is answering the very call your lord father is sworn to answer. I know that Lord Walder is not so shameful as to sit back and let strangers do his duty. A lord so steeped in tradition as your lord father will do the right thing and add his strength to ours.”

“But-“ she said, voice hard, “should we not cross The Twins, Ser Aenys, while Riverrun _will_ suffer, our cause will not fall with it. Thirty five thousand men and Ser Gerold Hightower ride behind the Stark banner. Now I grant, Tywin and his twenty thousand men might choose a good position and many of our men might die, but the north does not stand alone. Even now, Ser Oswell Whent rallies the lords of The Trident. By now, my son, with an army of twenty thousand men, and I’m told _quite_ the number of elephants, has made landfall in The Riverlands. When we fall upon Lord Tywin from the north, Ser Arthur Dayne will lead King Aegon’s van and strike him from the rear. The Old Lion will be surrounded by nearly three times his number _before_ his son can come to his aid.” She let her words hang. 

“I have not factored in these numbers the great many good men of Westeros who will not suffer a pretender on the Iron Throne either.”

She inched her horse closer to the Frey party. “When all is said and done, ser, my son will sit on his ancestors’ throne. When he does, he will reward his friends and bring Fire and Blood to his enemies and those who hold on to Tywin Lannister’s coat tails will be buried with him.” Another pregnant pause stretched out between them. 

“Now,” she said, “Ser Stevron, tell Lord Walder I would be honoured to accept, on behalf of my son, the wardship of his two grandsons. Princess Arianne, on the other hand, is to be my own daughter. Betrothed as she is to the king, I cannot accept Lord Walder’s gracious proposal. I would be glad of course to speak of other ways of tying our two houses. As for his last request, please do assure your gracious lord father, should he open his gates, I will of course remind King Aegon of his _decisive_ action here. I cannot promise more. One cannot, after all, make demands of a king.” 

For the first time, Jon saw the woman who would have been Rhaegar’s queen. 

Ser Stevron was riding away when Elia called out after him. “Ser Stevron,” she said, “Tell your lord father I think he is a smart man who will make the right decision.” 

The moment the Freys were out of earshot, Jon’s was only one of those who’d reminded the princess Lord Stark wasn’t free. 

“He doesn’t know that,” she said simply. “And I know my brother.”

“Was it wise to threaten him?” Lord Hornwood asked. 

“Men like Walder Frey only know strength,” she told him.

“You told him about Aegon’s movements.” 

Elia shrugged. “We are shooting down every one of his ravens and we see every man who leaves the castle.”

“This castle,” Lord Karstark corrected. 

_Any castle,_ Jon thought. Ghost was across the river. _Any man who leaves before Robb’s return, will never return himself._

“This castle or that,” the princess said, waving her hand dismissively. “Walder Frey’s only concern is himself. If he’s trying his chances, he’s already decided to drop Tywin. He’s making outrageous demands just so he can get _something_ from us. No Frey’s been a king’s ward before. I’ve given him two. I’ll give him no more.”

“Let’s hope you are right,” Lady Mormont cautioned. 

Right she was. Just before dusk, the drawbridge creaked down, and Robb rode forth with his great-uncle. Behind him were more Freys and long columns of pikemen, shuffling in blue steel ringmail and silvery grey cloaks.

Robb waited until they returned to the newly erected pavilion to tell them what was agreed. Walder Frey would give them access across The Twins and tie his four thousand men to their strength. As an assurance, two of his grandsons would be sent to Winterfell as Stark wards. As further assurance, Robb would leave behind four hundred northern troops, under Lord Helman Tallhart, to ensure Lord Walder did not renege on his promise. This was positioned as a force to strengthen the castle. 

Given all he’d heard of the man, this all sounded too good to be true.

“What is the price we pay for Lord Frey’s kindness,” Jon asked. 

“In addition to Father’s new wards, I am to take Lord Walder’s son Olyvar as my squire,” Robb said, pointing to a young man in the Frey party. “Bran is to marry Lord Walder’s youngest daughter upon his majority with the condition that they will be granted the lands around Moat Cailin as their home. And Lord Walder’s youngest son, Elmar,” he gestured at a gangly boy, “is to marry Arya if she is returned to us.” 

Theon snorted. “I suppose you’d better wish she _isn’t_ returned or the Kingslayer will be the least of your concerns.”

Jon only had eyes for the boy. He was hardly a man and he couldn’t picture Arya in his bed. 

As Robb continued to speak to his lords of how the host would be split and who would go where, Jon busied himself with straightening the tray in front of him, and wiping up a tiny wine stain. He could not bear to look at his brother's face. They didn’t even know where Arya was, whether she was alive, what horrors she’d seen and he’d bartered her away to...what? A boy who would never hold anything. He’d never have even a sniff of lordship if Lord Walder had only the sons who were in tent, factor in their children and grandchildren and Walder Frey’s other sons...Jon rubbed his temple as Robb droned on. 

“Have you lost your mind?” he hissed when they left the tent. 

“No,” Robb said. “I don’t particularly like it but this is war.” 

“And the last born son of a man with more than twenty is the best you could do?” Jon scoffed in derision. 

“Should I have accepted a man old enough to be her father just because he had a better chance at inheriting? Arya will be cared for.”

“Where? Here? Where she knows not a single soul?” 

Robb looked around them, lowering his voice and placing a hand on Jon’s shoulder, he guided him to a quieter space further from the castle. “Father can grant her a holdfast of her own. Perhaps near The Gift. That way she’ll still be close to you.” 

“She will never agree to this.” 

“She will have to do her duty just as Father and our mother did.” 

“The same was expected of _my_ mother,” Jon told him. For the first time he began to understand the woman who’d carried him and died to bring him to the world. He sighed long and wearily. “We don’t even know where she is. You could’ve told them she’s lost to us. You could have told them Father would be the one to give his children away. You could have-“ He rubbed his eyes. “Now even if we do get her back, she’ll be shipped off to a stranger’s home all alone. She will never forgive you for that.” 

“You think I don’t know that?” Robb snapped. “Do you think I particularly enjoyed bowing cup in hand to that man? Offering him my siblings? I do not have the luxury to think of my own wants when my grandfather’s castle is under siege and my uncle is held hostage. Winter _is_ coming, Jon, and it’s time we all made sacrifices.”

“You could have-”

“She is my sister!” Robb shouted, banging his chest as he said the word ‘ _my.’_ Passing men stopped to look at them.

“ _Your_ sister.” Jon scoffed.

“Jon, I didn’t mean-” 

“No,” Jon interrupted him. “She is _your_ sister and Lord Glover is ready to leave. I must go. I wish you all the best in taking back _your_ grandfather’s castle and saving _your_ uncle. Try not to die and take the old direwolf with you. Ghost will serve me well. You have fewer men.” 

“Jon,” Robb said more softly but Jon had already left. _His_ brother was awaiting them in the south.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First things first, they have 15,000 more men than in canon because Ned didn’t leave Cat to (not) deliver his instructions. 
> 
> Robb wanted to name The Greatjon to lead the foot in the books. Upon Cat’s guidance, he settles on Roose Bolton because “he’s cunning.” What does Roose do? Be cunning lol. He puts other houses’ men at the front, throws them into Tywin’s trap and leaves with his own men intact when they’re defeated. The Greatjon would have thrown their force at Tywin too but he would’ve done so in good faith. I wondered why Robb didn’t choose one of the Glovers/Lord Karstark etc but understand for plot purposes, the Green Fork is a show of Roose’s opportunism. How will choosing Ethan change things?
> 
> Robb makes sure the Freys see the army won’t fall apart even if they do take him hostage & circumvents descent by reminding every lord in turn that it’s not him personally they’re sworn to but to Winterfell. What can I say, the boy has ice in his veins. 
> 
> Even so, Walder squeezes him for things he could not otherwise dream of because he smells their desperation. Riverrun is about to fall after all. 
> 
> Elia, on the other hand, is a step removed from that and bets on Old Walder’s self-interest to move him.
> 
> Jon, like Robb, is capable of making difficult decisions...until Arya’s concerned. I don’t think he thinks of his feelings on the subject as romantic. Like Arya, in their last chapter together, he’s coming to terms with the idea that even when she returns (if ever) they won’t be the same as before. If you don’t think he’d be salty about Arya being betrothed, I’ll remind you he wanted to send her across the Narrow Sea in the books just to make sure Stannis (someone he was actively helping) couldn’t marry her off.
> 
> Anyway, while Jon and Robb bicker about Arya I can’t help but imagine Bran playing Lord of the Crossing with (his sworn enemies) the two Walders and being like, “Mayhaps, I’ll marry your sister/aunt/cousin/whoever.” Translation: I’m joining the Kingsguard suckers 🤪 
> 
> Jon has his time in the (winter but really spring) sun in his next chapter. We get more Jon & Ser Gerold then too. They’ve been marching together, I’m sure they’ve had some conversations but those come to a head near the Ruby Ford. Next, it’s time for Cersei.


	44. Cersei

**Cersei**

The queen smiled at the banners snapping in the wind from where they hung off the castle walls. They all depicted the proud lion of Lannister not the crowned stag. _As they should. The stag was no worthy consort for the lion._ The queen had seen to it that the prancing stag was taken off the walls upon Robert’s death and replaced entirely with the roaring lion of her house. Robert and his meddlesome brothers were dead. She was not. _The dragon had its turn, as did the stag. Now it’s my turn._ It was a gift her son had given her. Approaching his sixteenth name day, Joff was of an age to challenge her as regent. Like his sire though, both natural and assumed, he had no head for the game of thrones. That suited her just fine, no one could rule on his behalf better than she could. So she let him lose himself in preparation for his name day tourney - not that many would attend with her father and Jaime off at war. It had taken quite the effort for her to quell him when he heard the northern army was led by Ned Stark’s son. Joff fancied himself a warrior and swore to take the City Watch and lead the charge himself. The only thing that managed to calm him was telling him he was needed here to lead their forces if the Targaryen boy was to turn his sights upon the city. The longer she kept him busy in his own affairs, the more time she had to see an end to all his enemies for him. Hers and his were one and the same after all. 

For years, the queen had bided her time. She’d survived the years of her marriage to Robert on nothing but hate. The black contempt that took hold of her heart the night he first called her Lyanna nurtured her as Robert drank and wenched his way to the grave. It sustained her in the face of Renly’s attempts to first muzzle her and then replace her with Mace Tyrell’s little hen. Her hate, her strength, preserved her when Stannis stuck his nose into her business and operated through Old Jon Arryn. It kept her standing when Ned Stark took up the mantle his foster father had left behind. 

Now, _she_ ruled while her enemies lay dead, or weak and at her mercy. 

_Robert, Jon Arryn, Renly, Stannis all dead_ . As glad as she was to see Robert’s end, it was the deaths of his brothers that filled her with the most glee. She’d brought about the end of Renly and all his airs and graces. _If only I could have been there to see it._ Stannis followed his brothers to the grave before she could even spare him a thought - _a proof if ever of the favour of gods upon me._ She lit a candle to The Stranger for ridding her of his pestilence at a time that required her to turn her attentions to rule. 

She sent Renly’s body to Storm’s End with a royal decree declaring Tommen the new lord of Storm’s End and demanded men be sent to King’s Landing to protect their new king and lord. To ensure they heeded her call, she’d also sent the heads of the ‘ _outlaws’_ who killed their beloved lord. Lord Varys had rightly warned her about the threat Renly posed but the queen was not so stupid as to not have a scapegoat to blame for Renly’s death. So she sent Vylarr, the head of the Lannister guard, out with her own men after the gold cloaks who carried out the ambush. _Pay them in steel,_ she ordered him. When the men came to the agreed meeting point, they gave up their weapons to receive their payment. They had. Now their heads decorated her walls and, supposing Renly’s body had reached Storm’s End, they also adorned the strong walls of Robert’s childhood home. _Vylarr also brought me back another gift._ She sent a head to Highgarden with news of his survival. 

Loras Tyrell was brought back to her bloodied and at death’s door. _See to it that he survives,_ she ordered Pycelle. Though it would have served her for him to die, after recent events she decided he was worth more to her alive. As thanks, the queen also lit a candle to the Crone for her wisdom in wresting him from The Stranger’s hands on her behalf. So long as she had Mace Tyrell’s beloved son, the golden roses were beholden to her much as they might despise her. The queen had a long memory. They had tried to overthrow her. _Now I hold their heart to do with as I please._ She prayed for the Knight of Flowers’ survival as strongly as she prayed for Robert’s death. A wise queen knew when to attack and when to hold back. She would make the Tyrells suffer and squeeze them for all they had later. 

Just as she would the cripple in her dungeons. The man Robert spoke about as if he was formidable was now whimpering in chains. Thought of him almost made her forget how he sneered at her that day in the godswood and in his cell. He had the nerve to put his hands on her. _Just as Robert had_ . She watched as her men beat him in the way no one ever had Robert. _He didn’t seem so formidable then._ He never was. He had only attacked her because Jaime was so far away. The man Robert waxed lyrical about was no match for her brother. _No man is._ Jaime possessed an air that dominated every man who ever came near him. Her brother was arrogant, supremely self-assured and when he needed to, he reminded all why he walked the way he did. She would do the same. Before the day was over, she’d cow Ned Stark and bend him to her will. 

“Your Grace.” Dorcas said, wheeling in a rail of colourful dresses. “Which would you like?” 

The queen had put aside her mourning clothes. _I have no cause to mourn, only to celebrate._ Black had never been her colour. With her fair skin, it made her look half a corpse herself. She had only favoured the dress with the red rubies because she’d had it made to celebrate Robert’s death in the colours of Rhaegar’s house. 

It was ash now. Rhaegar’s son set his eyes upon that which belonged to her and her son. Now that she had finally gotten her due they wanted to take it from her. She would never let them. _None of them._ Frail Elia Martell with her black eyes and flat chest had robbed her of Rhaegar thanks to Aerys’ madness. She would not rob her of her hard won prize. Cersei Lannister was a lioness of the rock, the daughter of Tywin. She would not cow in the face of a child still green around the ears or his feeble mother. _King’s Landing is not Dragonstone and the days I would worry that someone would take what is mine are gone._ Her father would return soon with wolf pelts around his shoulders. When he did, they would turn their attention to the Dornishmen and their boy king.

“The crimson gown with the golden sleeves of Myrish lace,” the queen said. _I am a lion. Tywin’s heir in truth and I will do what he failed to finish._

“It would look beautiful on you, Your Grace.” 

“Everything does,” Jocelyn Swyft added, as she helped the queen into her stockings. 

The queen put her arms into the gown’s sleeves. The lace was costly but as the rightful queen she always had to look her best. They had chosen this life for her so she would use the tools they left to her. When she was small, she’d dress in Jaime’s clothes as a lark. When they swapped clothes no one could tell them apart. She was always startled by how differently men treated her when they thought that she was Jaime. _Then the day came when they put a sword in Jaime’s hand and imprisoned me in skirts._

“Cinch tighter,” the queen ordered as she girded herself for the day’s battle. The gown was held together by a bodice made of the golden glint of a plate of armour. 

Today's council was a closed session held in the small council chambers, not in the Throne Room. It would not do well to have her meetings overheard and seeing as she could not sit on the Iron Throne, she did not want it taunting her. Only the king and his Hand could sit upon the throne of power. For all her own power, Cersei could never sit the seat Robert and Ned Stark had even though she had brought their ends. That rankled her. 

“Your Grace.” Ser Mandon Moore bowed as she went past. A knight of the Kingsguard was always posted outside the doors of the council chambers when the council was in session. Today it was the man Jon Arryn brought into the Kingsguard. 

“Ser Mandon.” The queen brushed his arm and shot him a coy smile. Jaime had always said the man could not be read but the queen knew the look of a man who wanted her. 

They all stood the moment she brushed in past the Valyrian sphinxes that guarded the door. 

“Your grace, you look…resplendent,” Pycelle mumbled as she walked in. With missing teeth, his mouth froze into a perpetual position of surprise at rest and had the look of an owl contemplating a juicy mouse when he spoke. 

“Crimson becomes you,” added in Littlefinger. 

Janos Slynt said something but the queen did not hear it. His lecherous smile was enough to make her sick. 

_They would never talk to Lord Tywin about his sartorial choices._

“Will His Grace be joining us?” asked Lord Varys. Cersei nearly allowed herself to smile at him to disarm him. Men had tripped over themselves for her smile since the day she grew teats. _This one is a eunuch._ She walked past him, chin raised, shoulders straight until she reached the king’s seat at the head of the table. “Lord Varys,” she said, “for the purposes of this council’s business, I _am_ the king.”

“Forgive me, Your Grace.” the eunuch gushed with a soft smile upon his powdered face. “I only asked as the late king insisted on being apprised against threats to his throne. I assumed his son would be the same.” 

The queen noted a twitch of Lord Baelish’s lips. 

_He mocks me._ None of them would ever act like this in Lord Tywin’s presence. No one had ever balked at her lord father. Under Tywin Lannister’s rule, men cowered. When Cersei spoke, they felt free to mock her. They had never acted like this in front of Robert either. _They gave Robert more respect than they give me, and Robert was a witless sot. It is all because I am a woman,_ the queen knew. _Because I cannot fight them with a sword._ She would not suffer it, not from a eunuch or a whoremonger. Cersei levelled them with a cold stare. Men had always flinched from a single look of Lord Tywin’s. “I am the king’s regent. It is for me to decide when to apprise him of matters and the council’s duty is to help me rule. Speaking of roles,” she leaned back into her seat, “what news does the Master of Whisperers have for me of Dragonstone?” 

“The prince-”

“The would-be-usurper.” Men had called Robert such before he took the throne. Now it was Joff’s. 

“Nothing flies or sails near Dragonstone but it is shot down or seized, Your Grace,” the eunuch said. “The...usurper continues in the vein of Lord Stannis in this regard.” 

Cersei wondered who was bankrolling the boy’s return. _Where did they get the ships? Dorne has scarcely two trees to make a forest._ All they knew of the boy was that he had a fleet that dwarfed the royal one. 

“A shame you have no news, my lord.” She stared at him. Not taking her eyes off him she said, “Maester Pycelle, write to Lord Redwyne. Let him know his queen summons him to King’s Landing. I am sure he misses his sons.” _He has more ships than anyone in the Seven Kingdoms and I have his sons._

“At once, Your Grace,” Pycelle nodded. 

“I am not completely without news, Your Grace,” Varys told her. “In the winesinks and the pot shops there are those who say that the rightful king has returned with his father’s bosom friends, Ser Arthur Dayne and Ser Oswell Whent. My little birds also tell me they speak of Ser Gerold Hightower in their party.” 

“One dead child is believable enough but are we to cower from a party of ghosts?” mocked Littlefinger.

The queen remembered them all. Ser Arthur Dayne had been the greatest sword in the Seven Kingdoms, Ser Gerold Hightower a living legend and Ser Oswell Whent untouchable in the melee.

“Do we pay you for such falsehoods?” the queen asked the Spider. “Those men have been moldering in their graves for seventeen years.”

“It is not the truth of it that matters, Your Grace,” the Spider replied. “It is the weight of their names. Our own king had Ser Barristan the Bold, a living, breathing, legend on his side until he dismissed him. Now he must contend with the power of ghosts.”

“The man was old.” _I wanted Jaime to have his position and Joff wanted The Hound to have his cloak._ She cut him off with an imperial wave of her hand. “Ser Barristan is decrepit and the knights you speak of are dust.”

“Be that as it may, Your Grace. While we cannot be sure about who is or is not in the boy’s company, if Ser Barristan was to join him…” 

“Lord Janos, see to it that he does not.” 

The new Lord of Harrenhal nodded eagerly. 

_A lion does not concern itself with the opinions of sheep,_ her father said. _Yet he killed The Tarbecks and The Reynes for their mockery._ “And while you are at it, I want the tongues of every man who calls the usurper the rightful king.” The smallfolk of King’s Landing had no love for the House of Lannister after the sack. It was no surprise to her that they would think of the boy martyr as their king. Lord Tywin had never cared for their hatred. It was not their love he desired, only their fear. She was his daughter. 

“Then before you know it, you will have yourself quite the collection of tongues,” Varys told her. “We also have our friends on the other hill to think of. Even before the boy’s return, the septons and begging brothers on Visenya’s Hill spoke of what befell Princess Elia and her children as an affront to all the laws of gods and men. Were we to take tongues for sentiments rather than deeds, I fear the day the begging brothers and the septons would amplify those words Against present threats....” 

“My own men tell me of whispers in the pot shops of those who go as far as doubting the king’s legitimacy,” Littlefinger told her. “Pointing to the absence of the stag upon our walls, they call King Joffrey’s ascension a Lannister grab at power. As you would know the last time only Lannister standards flew…”

_My father took the city. He had every right to raise his banners._

“There were those who called King Robert usurper until his death. Yet that is all they were, words. Were we to begin taking tongues for anyone who says anything untoward about the king, I fear you would have the tongues of half this city. The smallfolk all hate their lords and comfort themselves with whatever falsehood they can find. You’d be better off fighting fire with fire and spreading your own tales about what this foreign-raised boy would bring to Westeros.”

“I would sooner cut the source of those whispers,” she said forcefully. Her voice did not betray the fear that cinched around her heart. Was silencing these sorts of whispers not the reason why she killed Robert and Renly and had Ned Stark languishing in the black cells? How was she to contend with the buzz of a city? “Lord Varys, I want you to find me these traitors Lord Baelish speaks of.” _I will silence them before they poison the city._

“Yes, Your Grace.” The eunuch bobbed his powdered head. 

Janos Slynt asked her for more men. 

“I have sent for them,” she told him brusquely. “Grandmaester Pycelle, have we heard word from any of the Crownland houses?” 

“Yes, Your Grace,” Pycelle muttered, stroking the long white beard that flowed almost to his belt. “Houses Gyles and Stokesworth have written to say that they are sending men. Houses Massey, Faring and Chyttering, on the other hand, have written to say that they can not spare the men.” 

_No one disobeyed, Lord Tywin._ “Remind them of the penalty of refusing to their king,” she ordered and mentally noted those who balked her command. _Their time will come._

Littlefinger droned on about the cost of paying the City Watch if the Stormlords were to answer her summons to send more men. 

The question was enough to make her wonder why she had even named a Master of Coin if she had to be the one required to think of these things. It was _his_ job to find the coin. _He always had for Robert._

“I am sure you’ll find a way, Lord Baelish.” 

She stood, to signal that the meeting was at an end. “Lord Janos, escort me out.” The Queen Regent swept from the room in a rustle of brocade and silk. The scent of violets from her perfume lingered in the room long after she left. 

Only a man with as naked an ambition and as scrupleless as Janos Slynt would be able to help her with what she required. She could send Vylarr, of course, but she had sent him off to procure her a dainty finger. The queen wanted to present Sansa Stark’s own to her father but Littlefinger reminded her that the girl would be more useful to them if she still chased the dream of being queen. _A dream is all it will ever be._

“Do not return until they are all dead,” she ordered him. “And I will grant every one of your sons his own holdfast.” 

Lord Varys informed her that Stannis Baratheon, Jon Arryn and Ned Stark had all been to see one of Robert’s bastards. Cersei knew what they saw. The mothers of Robert’s bastards had hair of every shade but each one of Robert’s children was born with the raven-black hair of every Baratheon before him. She should have seen to this earlier just as she had the two twins he’d spilled into one of the serving women in Casterly Rock. _It was an oversight._ She would not be caught unprepared again. 

The climb to the top of Visenya’s Hill was slow. As the horses made their way up, the queen leaned back against a plump crimson cushion. She hated the smell of this city when it grew warm. Cersei was no stranger to big cities. As a child she had enjoyed the occasional outings to the public markets of Lannisport serviced by goldsmiths, soap makers, wineries with the sweet spiced wine of the Westerlands, furriers, apothecaries with rows of strange and wonderful potions packed in peculiar-sharpen bottles. In the squares jugglers performed stunts, mummers entertained with their tales and the Lannisport city guard patrolled clean, crime-free streets. All of that was more than she could say for the grimy streets the gold cloaks watched over here. 

Once the war was done, the queen had plans to build a new palace beyond the river. It would be a magnificent white castle surrounded by woods and gardens, long leagues from the stinks and noise of King’s Landing. 

From outside her litter came the voice of Ser Boros Blount. “Your Grace, we have arrived,” he said.

He extended a hand out to help her out of the litter. She’d have preferred to have been carried up all the way to the door of the sept but the holy mother of the kingdom and the defender of the faith needed to be seen to be devoted. She gave some thin coins to beggars on the street, keen not to let them touch her with their diseased hands and prayed over them. _Let them call this an affront to the gods,_ she said to herself. She would much rather kill them all. _Perhaps I still will_ but it did no harm to take a leaf out of Lord Baelish’s book. A few choice whispers would do her a world of good. 

Unlike Robert, Cersei knew how to play the game of thrones. Robert’s only great love had been war and the melee when he wanted to _play_ at war. That was his game - boisterous, rash, risking everything on chance. It required no thought, just brutish strength and recklessness. Jaime had been much the same. The game of thrones was the game of the truly great. Her father knew that. It was why Aerys was so jealous of him. _So do I._

The Fat One was already waiting for her at the top of the steps. High Septons gave up their names when they took the office. Sometimes one could wheedle out their old names from them, but often people gave them their own to differentiate between them. This one’s corruption was well-known and those who doubted it only needed to look at the girth of his middle and the richness of his clothes. 

Cersei knew she should kneel to him but she could not bring herself to do so. Thankfully, he met her on the steps before she could and saved her the trouble. He was bedecked in finery, crystal crown gleaming upon his head. 

“Your Grace,” he said, taking a hold of her hands. 

“Your High Holiness,” she kissed his fat fingers. “It is so good to look upon your holy face.” She looked behind her to make sure the crowd saw her bend her neck to kiss his hands. They had. _Good._

He led her through the Hall of Lamps where they were showered in the bright colours of the leaded glass then into the sept proper. The air was sweetened with the smell of incense and beside the seven altars candles beamed like stars. There were hundreds at the feet of the Mother and almost as many for the maid, but you could count the Stranger’s candles on two hands and still have fingers left.

Robert lay dead in the tombs beneath the castle. 

“I must pray before we speak” she told the Fat One and lit candles to The Stranger. “For King Robert,” she explained. _May he burn in the Seven Hells._ “And my good brothers Lord Stannis and Lord Renly.” _May they join him there._

She lit a candle at the feet of The Crone for wisdom, at the Warrior for Jaime and her father, at the Father for herself. _Strengthen my hand and my rule_. She put a candle at the Mother’s feet for her children and stood to return to the Fat One. She had nothing to say to The Maid or The Smith just now. 

He droned on about some debts Littlefinger owed him when he invited her to join him for a meal. 

“Yes,” she said when he was finished counting with great specificity just how much The Faith was owed. “You will be paid back in full and with interest.” 

“With interest?”

Cersei took a bite of the boar. She had developed quite the taste for the meat after Robert’s death. 

“The Great Sept of Baelor is a delight to the eyes of all worshippers, Your Grace. Wouldn’t it be just marvellous to add to it’s beauty and it’s size?”

She knew she had him when his eyes widened.

“Why should the Starry Sept be held as the most beautiful sept in the Seven Kingdoms when this is the seat of our Holy High Septon?” She let the question hang for a moment. “Our king means for the great sept to be the largest in the Seven Kingdoms. We are after all a people with great devotion to our faith. He even means to have your statue erected in the heart of the new portion to celebrate your own illustrious reign.” 

The ambition in his eyes was as naked as a newborn. He didn’t even bother to speak of the ills of vanity. From there it only took a few choice whispers of the heathenry of the Targaryen boy and Joff’s devotion to the Seven before the High Septon agreed to preach about the virtues of her son and against those who would bring foreign religions to Westeros. 

The whole encounter steeled her for her meeting with Ned Stark. She felt brave and confident and powerful. She would bend Ned Stark to her will just as she had the High Septon. 

It was early afternoon by the time she got back to the Red Keep. “You have the finger?” she asked Vylarr as they made their way down to the black cells.

“Right here,” he said, holding out a velvet pouch.

“Where did you procure it?”  
“Lord Baelish gave me a girl.” 

_Always resourceful, that one._

She could feel the bitter cold of the lowest dungeons in the castle long before she got there. The torches shivered. The shock of cold that passed through her spine was only a forebear of the one that would freeze her heart when she got to the lowest floor. 

Two turnkeys, judging by their clothes, lay dead on the floor, their blood a river between them. 

One of her red cloaks bent down to feel for the first man’s pulse. “This one’s been dead for at least a day,” he told her. 

“This one’s still alive,” another one said.

“It was Rugen,” the man rasped. “Rugen let them in.” He croaked in a breath and didn’t exhale again.

When her eyes fell upon the open door of Ned Stark’s cell, the queen’s stomach fell down to her knees. On the wall was the Lion of Lannister with a spear that went in through it’s back and out through its heart. She ran past the dead bodies and toward the cell. Ned Stark was gone. _Gone!_ _  
_“Your Grace,” Vylarr said, as he pulled out a note stabbed into the door.

The queen snatched it from him. There was only one line on the piece of paper. _The Lannisters are not the only ones who pay their debts._ Her blood ran cold as she looked at the speared lion again. _The golden spear of sunspear._ It stood out against the Lannister crimson. Ned Stark saved Elia Martell’s life during the sack. Suddenly she remembered Elia Martell’s words to her in Winterfell. “The princess is beautiful,” she told Cersei. “ _May you always be able to protect her. The game of thrones never stops and is, I’ve learnt to my own sorrow, a most inconstant source of security._ ” 

Cersei picked up her skirts and ran. “Your Grace,” Vylarr called out after her. She kept running. “My children!” she shouted when she came upon Ser Meryn Trant on the serpentine steps. “Where are my children?”

Tommen was riding against a quintain in the yard with Ser Boros leading his horse. Myrcella was watching him.

“Mother!” she beamed when she saw her. “Are you alright?” she asked when she finally got closer.

Cersei’s heart only seemed to start beating upon seeing them. She took her girl into her arms. “Where’s the king?” she asked Ser Meryn. He’d clearly run after her. 

“He is at a fitting for his nameday clothes.” 

“Who is with him?” 

“The Hound, Ser Preston and Ser Arys.” 

She only let herself breathe then. Still, the world seemed to spin around her. 

“Ser Boros should be protecting the royal family,” she said. “Not leading around Tommen’s horse. Where is Ser Aron?” 

“He travelled to Dorne to see his ailing mother.” 

The queen heard a scream of terror.

“Ser Meryn!!” shouted a red cloak. He wouldn’t address the queen directly. He only sank to his knees when he saw her. “Ser Meryn, I think you should see this.” 

“Myrcella,” the queen said. “Stay with your brother. Ser Meryn, stay with my children. Take them to their rooms and lock them there. Do not leave them until you are relieved by another knight of the Kingsguard.” 

Vylarr fell into step with her. They went past the serpentine steps and into a sunken courtyard where Ser Mandon Moore lay dead, eyes unseeing with a dagger in his throat. The speared lion was over his body as well. A teetering washerwoman stood there. _She had been the one who screamed._

She curtsied on shaky knees when she saw the queen. “Stand,” Cersei told her. “What did you see?” 

“Ju-just the knight, Your Grace. I was only goin’ to return these linens,” she pointed to a clean pile on the grass, “when I saw the knight and-” 

“Stop crying,” Cersei ordered. “Take her to a room,” she told the red cloak. “Keep her there until I say otherwise.” He grabbed a hold of her arm and sped off. 

“Find me Janos Slynt,” she ordered another. “And tell every captain I want all the gates closed. No more checking who is entering. Close them, bar them. No one leaves or enters. I want guards at every exit of the castle as well and no word of this to anyone!” 

Pycelle appeared near her. His gasp told her of his approach. “No word of this gets out,” she said to all the men around her. “Take him away.” She grabbed Pycelle’s arm. “If anyone asks, Ser Mandon is sick and being treated.” _Joff cannot hear of this. Not yet._

“Who-who did this?” Pycelle whimpered. 

“Traitors.” It was only when she looked at the body again that she saw the discarded blue fan and the lone slipper. The queen ran into the grass and sank to the ground to turn over the slipper. It was embroidered with a wolf. “The girl!” she shouted. “Sansa.” She grabbed Vylarr’s breeches. “Find me Sansa!” Then she retched painfully into the flowers. 

Janos Slynt came to her hours later. “Where were you?” she seethed when he came.

“Your Grace sent me to-” 

She hit him hard in the face. “I sent you to do one task-”

“You told me to-”

“You have been gone the entire day!” she shouted in a voice that was all steel. To her ears she even sounded like her father. “And while you were gone, Ned Stark escaped my cells, a brother of the Kingsguard was killed and Sansa Stark is gone! Why were you named commander of the City Watch if you cannot even see to the security of the king’s own castle?!” 

He stared at her in shock. She turned away to pour herself some wine with a shaky hand. 

“Did you at least do what I asked of you?” _I need at least one bright spot on this day._

“There are no bastards in the city, Your Grace,” he quavered. 

She spun around suddenly to stare at him. “What do you mean?” 

“We’ve looked everywhere you said, Your Grace,” he said. “That’s why I took so long. I oversaw the questioning myself. All of them left in the last few days. The woman, Chataya, said the girl with King Robert’s bastard left last night with a lord who did not give his name. There was a bastard apprentice in Master Tobho Mott’s armoury until this morning but a lord of the same description came for him as well.” 

“Describe him.” 

The candles in her rooms guttered in a draft. Their shadows danced on the wall like demons taunting her. It was way past midnight now. The wind howled around the Tower of the Hand. Its last occupant was prowling somewhere. She pictured him hobbling around on one leg inside her walls, biding his time until the moment came for him to pounce upon her as he did in the cell. He’d wrap his hard hands around her neck once more and this time he would kill her. _Not if I find him first._

Vylarr led a dozen guards with torches and ropes and lanterns below the cells. For close to eight hours the useless lot of them groped around through twisting passages, narrow crawl spaces, hidden doors, secret steps, and shafts that plunged down into utter blackness. Two of them even vanished exploring a side tunnel. Some of the other guards swore they could hear them calling faintly through the stone but the queen thought them all liars and traitors. She would have killed those who returned without their companions for failing to watch over the traitors among them but she needed them to keep looking. So she sent them in again. 

“We only found darkness and dust in there, Your Grace...and dragons,” Vylarr told her of his own investigations around secret passages in the dungeons. _Dragons._ She thought of the speared lion they’d draped Ser Mandon’s body with in the gardens. _How do they steal someone in view of all these guards?_ She was surrounded by traitors and she knew not who to trust. For half a groat she could have killed Vylarr too for failing to find the Stark lord. Yet as little as she trusted him at the moment, she trusted everyone else even less. 

The news she did get was not particularly interesting either. No one really knew the missing undergaoler and the chief gaoler nearly bored her to the point of death with his reference to all the notes he made complaining of the man never being there when he was needed. He’d then taken her to his cell, a damp and dreary hole with mildewed straw. The queen left immediately. 

Littlefinger came to see her after she sent Janos away. _The man he put in the position._

“I hear we’ve got quite the situation,” he said as he slinked in.

“I’m not quite sure I know what you mean,” she said, trying to keep her voice nonchalant. 

“I have heard tell of an escaped prisoner, his missing daughter and a dead knight. Are they lies?” 

The queen grit her teeth.

“I bring you answers, my queen,” he said in response to her silence. “Not more problems.” 

“And what are those answers?” 

“Your missing undergaoler is a man called Rugen, brought into the employ of the Red Keep during the reign of the Mad King. He had a habit of keeping himself to himself so I have naught to update you on him but I do have men looking for him.” 

“I knew all this,” she said, annoyed. “Was it you who let Ned Stark go?” 

Littlefinger leaned back into his seat, the picture of amusement. “Of course not.” 

“You have to deny it. To do otherwise would be to admit treason, wouldn’t it?” She stared into his cat-like grey-green eyes. “Janos Slynt was absent when he should have been here-” 

“I hear you sent him out on a...shall we say delicate task?” 

“You know _what_ I asked of him and where I sent him. You put him in that position.”

“Lord Arryn agreed to put him in that position,” he corrected her. 

“Does he report everything I say to you?”

“I am not the only one with ears in these walls.” 

“Ned Stark escaped from the black cells-” 

“Isn’t that a wonder?” 

“The chief undergaoler was a cloth merchant before he bought his position from you.” 

“The man paid well and the king wanted gold from me. He never asked me quite how I procured the coin in his coffers.”

“The chief gaoler tells me he complained of this Rugen in reports that went to you, the man who authorised payments.” 

“Those reports also went to the Hand of the King, to Ser Ilyn Payne himself-”

“Ser Ilyn cannot read.”

“They also went to Grandmaester Pycelle and to Lord Varys.” 

“You seemed pretty keen to have the little dove be your wife. What is to say you did not take what you were denied?” 

“Let’s say I wanted Sansa for myself, why would I free a man I helped destroy?”

He had her there. Littlefinger had handed Ned Stark to her on a plate. 

“Ned Stark being alive does not serve me at all.” 

“What does serve you?” 

“That which serves the crown.”  
 _A lie,_ the queen knew. 

“I have been to see Grandmaester Pycelle today and saw Lord Janos leave as I entered. We appear to be missing a council member this evening. Shouldn’t you be questioning your Master of Whisperers about your missing prisoners?” 

“I have sent for him,” she told him. She had been so worried about ensuring no news of this got to Joffrey that she had forgotten about Varys until hours after she found the bodies. She’d sent Ser Preston Greenfield to find him for her. Cold fingers crept up her spine as she thought about his absence. He should have been to see her. He was always around. Whenever anything of import happened in the Red Keep, the eunuch appeared as if from nowhere. _Today he hasn’t._

“As I said, Your Grace,” Littlefinger said leaning into her, “Should you need me, you only have to ask. I serve at the crown’s pleasure.” She could smell his minty breath. He gave her a look pregnant with meaning, one she’d seen in the High Septon’s face just earlier that day. His father had been the smallest of small lords she remembered. He had grown up on a few stony acres on the shore of the Fingers. 

“Find me Ned Stark,” she told him, brushing her hand up his thigh. “And I will have you rule beside me.” 

She knew she had _him_ when she saw the flash of hunger in his eyes right before she kissed his lips. He had just as many spies as Varys. 

“Find them,” she whispered as he dressed. “Find them for me, Petyr before word gets to Joff.” 

“I won’t rest until I do,” he promised. If the Martells helped Ned Stark, it was in his interests to see Joff upon the throne. The Stark lord was not like to forgive his betrayal. _Unless that was a rouse..._

It was much too dark to see anything outside, but the queen was gazing out into the past, to the last time she saw Ned Stark. _I take pleasure in anything that steals your sleep,_ he told her. _I will revel in your fall._ It was one thing to silence a few begging brothers and men of no consequence. It was another thing entirely for Ned Stark, Robert’s own Hand, to live and proclaim the Targaryen boy the rightful king. _I told him his son saw Jaime and I. I taunted him and had him beaten. And now I have nothing to threaten him with._ Meryn Trant let the little one escape him and Mandon the older one. It was only by the grace of the gods that they hadn’t gotten through to the chambers where Loras Tyrell lay. 

“Ser Meryn,” she called out suddenly. “Bring me the Redwyne Twins.” She would not let them get their hands on those two to deprive her of the only surety she had for seaborne protection.

With a shaky hand, Her Grace poured herself a second cup of wine from the table near the fireplace. Outside, the storm approached its zenith, howling around corners, beating with angry fists against shutters and windows, demanding entrance. _I would prefer the storm outside to that within._ She gulped down her wine. One cup, two, three. She’d need to tell Joffrey in the morning before he heard it from someone else. Perhaps she would even have them found before then. 

Varys was yet to come to her. They all had come to her. Pycelle with his mumbled words, Littlefinger with his airy ones, even Janos Slynt but the Master of Whisperers was nowhere to be seen. _Littlefinger would not hear of anything before him._ She took a swig of her drink. He was part of this. He had been goading her this morning. She should have seen it then. _I should have seen it before. The boy could not have taken Dragonstone with an entire fleet at his back and take us unawares._ _Damn him._ He must have been the one to take the bastards as well. He’d been the one to tell her the men had been sniffing around them. _They will use them against me._

 _I will find him before he escapes._ The city gates were closed entirely now. No one could get in or out. It was only a matter of time before he, her prisoners, and all those who helped them were caught. _He took them from under your nose._

She was on her fifth glass when the door creaked open. 

“Your Grace,” Ser Meryn started, “the Redwynes did not return from their trip out today.” 

Her heart froze.

“Where did they-” 

Joffrey walked in with Sandor Clegane over his shoulder. Her son was still dressed for court in a velvet doublet studded with a double row of golden lion’s heads. Even this late into the night and in her private quarters, he still wore the slim coronet of gold and sapphires she had made for him. _And he carries a sword._ Cersei swallowed the last of her wine and put the cup down. 

“Leave us,” she said.

“Dog,” her son said, stroking his sword. “Stay. You too Ser Meryn.” 

Cersei blinked at him. 

“I have not seen you around today, mother,” he said almost like one who cared for her.

“Well,” she smiled tremulously from where she stood. “Ruling is hard work.” 

He gave her a cutting smile and sat down on an empty chair. It had been a long time since Joff smiled without there being some joke only he knew about. 

“Please sit.” 

She did.

“Have you been sleeping well?” He rarely inquired after her sleep. She knew the question meant something else entirely, she only hoped it was not the one she thought.

“I am as well rested as I can be.” 

“Hmm,” he sighed. “You look tired. Are you sure you are able to manage the task I have given you?” 

“Of course.” 

He nodded and propped an elbow against the table next to where he sat for greater stability. “I am to reach my majority soon. When I do, your regency is over.”

“That is not for a month yet.” 

“King Jaehaerys was four-and-ten when he began ruling in earnest.” 

_You are not The Conciliator,_ the queen thought. Much as she loved him, her son was Maegor reborn. _And like Visenya I will protect him._

“They say the Targaryen boy fights beside his men-”

“Those are just words, no one has seen the boy.”

“They call him the rightful king.” 

“You have the Iron Throne.” 

“Robb Stark is only a year older than I and he leads the northern host. Don’t tell me those are just words either. I’ve seen the ravens.”

_Pycelle._

“You have every right to join your council’s meetings, Your Grace.” 

“I will do more than just join. I will rule. Speaking of rule…” He stretched his arms. “I have decided to sentence that traitor Ned Stark to death tomorrow. The Black Cells are too fine a place for a man who would so blatantly tell me the Iron Throne isn’t mine. I would rather see his head stuck atop my walls.” 

“Ned Stark must die,” she agreed, trying to keep her voice level, “but not here, not in this city. You should have him confess to his treason _after_ the war is done.” _When I find him._ “Even then be merciful. Send him to the Wall and let some misfortune fall upon him on the road. Let him sully his own word and expire alone. You will sit more comfortably upon your throne for it.” 

He looked right through her. “Some might say you fear him.”

“Most others say I do what is best for Westeros.”

He grinned again. Her son’s smiles were little more than a curl of the lip. His green eyes glittered like wildfire with an unnerving effect _. He has a pretty face for such a ruthless boy._

He stood and began stalking her expensive Myrish carpets.

The only sounds in the room were that of the crackling fire. Cersei stared at the swirling smoke inside the hearth. Her eyes traversed each curve as it wafted up into the chimney keen to avoid looking at the two white cloaks Joff insisted on joining him. She lost herself in the swirls so much that she hadn’t noticed him spin around and point the sword at her throat. 

“Is that why you tried to keep news of his escape from me?” 

_Someone spoke._ She considered a denial, but he would only see that as an insult. She chose silence until he began drawing the point of his sword across her throat. With the eerie clarity that comes with life’s most fearsome moments, she noted the sharp edge of the steel and the patterns along its length. He was her son. She’d conceived him at Greenstone in old Lord Estermont’s castle the night Robert went to his cousin’s bed. She carried him for nine months, gave birth to him, suckled him herself and she knew he would do it. He would kill her if he wished. She blinked at him. 

“I-”

“A knight of my Kingsguard lies dead, a prisoner escapes through your fingers _with_ his daughter, and you did not see fit to tell me.” 

“Your Gr-” 

“One could almost say you are making quite the habit of losing Starks.” He twisted the sword so it scratched her throat. She could feel a thin droplet of blood. “I should have never let you rule. Women are such weak creatures.”

The queen heard a servant scurry down the hall. Just as well. If she had found any hall boy sneaking behind her drapes to listen to her humiliation she would thrash them to death. _It’s enough that he does so in front of these two._

He pushed the sword’s point into the hollow of her throat. “Traitors!” she cried. “Oh Joff, we are surrounded by traitors. I didn’t want to tell you until I brought them to you for justice. Oh my son,” she threw herself at his feet. “I didn’t want to come to you until I found them all.”

“Who?” 

“Varys,” she said immediately _._ “He has disappeared.” _And taken my pawns._ “The Mad King brought him to court. He tricked us all, Joff, but I will find him.” 

“He did not act alone.” 

“No.” Cersei hoped to gift her son new play things when she brought back Ned Stark but better to give him scapegoats now if only to redirect his ire. “Ser Ilyn Payne too. The dungeons were his responsibility.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m not sure about this chapter. I had serious writer’s block writing. I started off writing this story for my own entertainment and I don’t want to lose that. I find myself questioning whether I’m writing a bunch of rubbish a lot recently but I’m also determined to see this through so bear with me as I work through this funk.. 
> 
> In the books Cersei avoids telling Joff about Renly proclaiming himself king because he would want to face him in battle. Can you imagine if he had? LOL!
> 
> They have a shortage of men in King’s Landing when the Battle of Blackwater happens partly because there are a number of Crownland houses not sworn to Dragonstone that end up on Stannis’ side and others we don’t hear of. I wonder if their Targaryen loyalties had a role to play in them deciding they wouldn’t bother to extend help to Lannisters. 
> 
> The smallfolk of King’s Landing hate the Lannisters (they probably hate all nobles but have a special dislike for the Lannisters after the sack). They did care for Ser Barristan though and the moment Cersei and Joffrey have him thrown out everyone with an iota of smarts about them sees what an idiotic decision it is because of the weight of his name. How do they compete with Aegon’s Kingsguard? With the exception of Jaime, who generally has shit for honour with the populace, and Sandor, who is not even a knight, Joff’s Kingsguard seem like a pile of wet fish in comparison. Look out for a war of words and ideas, I suppose. Cersei is already starting it with her whispers about Aegon’s religiosity. 
> 
> Yes, Cersei also wanted to build another palace across the Blackwater and Jaime had to be the one to remind her that Tommen is only king because he has the Iron Throne. The moment he moves he would be a claimant just like Stannis. Grasping even that is hard for our dear queen regent lmao. 
> 
> She also wanted to kill Ser Ilyn when Tyrion escaped until Jaime (the culprit who ordered the entire thing) spoke her out of it. Sad he’s not around isn’t it?
> 
> As for Cersei and Littlefinger...I mean I’m not putting it beyond either of them okay.
> 
> And lastly, I totally imagine Oberyn taking his time to think about what kind of memento he’d like to leave for the Lannisters 😂


	45. Eddard

**Eddard**

“I cannot,” Ned said looking down the steep drop. “I can barely stand.” Tomard and Ser Aron were still holding him up. His leg throbbed with indescribable pain. The words tore themselves from his dry throat. “You will.” Oberyn Martell flipped a coin to the scrawny boy who’d guided them through the tunnels.The boy, a little older than his own Rickon, caught the coin, grinned and scurried back the way they came. 

“Why?” 

“I told you why.” 

Tugging on the rope, the gigantic man he was told was named Ser Archibald Yronwood wrapped it around his huge belly and disappeared from view down the cliff. 

“I’m already dead.” The words were barely a whisper. Ned dropped his head, struggling to keep his eyes open in the bright light of day. It had been so long since he saw anything brighter than the light of a torch. His cell had stank of his own waste; of vomit and excrement, and his body carried the smell with it too. From his clothes came the distinct smell of dried piss and the bandage around his leg looked a grey brown marked with shit and blood and puss. 

“Send him over.” Ser Archibald climbed back up and Tom and Ser Aron obeyed. Ned saw then the jagged steps carved into the cliff side.

“I can’t.” 

“Send him over,” Oberyn sniped in a low voice. 

They placed him at Ser Archibald’s front with the Dornish knight’s knee supporting Ned’s weight as they made the climb down. The man’s legs were as large as a tree trunk, each one as wide as both Ned’s legs put together. 

More than once his hand nearly slipped and Ned thought the fall would kill him. Each of the jagged steps cleaved at Ned’s front but he held on, each one sapping him of the last of his strength. Now and again a craggy rock would catch his leg sending agonising pain to every part of his body. The clouds grew heavy with unreleased burdens, the air fresh with the smell of oncoming rain. He could die for something to drink. His tongue had grown swollen with thirst and his throat tight. _A few more steps._ The fever was burning through him. He closed his eyes. Finally they were met with a dry river bed.

“We had to wait for low tides,” Oberyn explained when he made the climb down. Ned sat beside the steps too tired to move. The chills were racking through him. The last thing he remembered was Ser Archibald lifting him, stink and all. The agony in his leg brought the darkness. 

He awoke inside a cave hewn into the side of the cliff. The rapid thump of his heart was loud in his ears but it couldn’t cover the sound of splashing water. He opened his eyes to see the men had stripped and were washing by an underwater body of water deeper in the cave.

A square faced boy, barely twenty came to him and helped him sit up. “Drink, my lord,” he said, placing a water skin to Ned’s lips. It was full of honey water. Ned’s crinkled lips suckled as if he was once again a babe at his mother’s teat. 

“Slowly,” Oberyn said. “He can’t drink it all at once.” 

Ned wrapped his hand around the skin, and the boy’s hand, and continued to drink. 

Oberyn Martell prised the skin from his hands, knelt beside him and tore his shirt open with a dagger. He grimaced at the sight of Ned’s grimy skin. Tom brought a bucket of water that smelled strongly of vinegar and began washing him. The caked dirt dissolved off his skin with every stroke. The cold water made him shiver. 

“They’ll find us.” 

“They’ll send men after us I’m sure but they won’t find us.” 

The water darkened when Tom dipped the cloth in the bucket and twisted it. 

“My daughters…”

“My Nymeria went to get Sansa,” Oberyn answered. “They should be on Davos’ ship by now.” 

“And Arya?” 

The look on Oberyn’s face caused Ned’s innards to twist. “We couldn’t find her.” 

“I can’t leave her-” Ned made as if to rise. Pain shot up his crippled leg. 

“You will die if you don’t,” the prince said forcefully, holding Ned’s nape tight. 

“I don’t care. My daughter-”

Oberyn lay his forehead against Ned’s. “Live. Take her revenge if they took her life and if they didn’t... we’ll find her. We still have men in the city. We will get her back but you need to be alive to see her again.” 

Ned closed his eyes. Grey sparks danced beneath his lids. He concentrated on the chaotic pattern. His ears buzzed with the words. _Take her revenge._ Arya. _My little girl_ . Ned Stark loved all his children. He would die for any of them. Had already decided he would... _It wasn’t supposed to happen like this._ His heart felt as if it was being shredded. He remembered her squeezing herself beside him as he dealt with his daily business, a grin on her face, flowers in her hands, a story on her lips, mischief in her wake. _Arya Underfoot._

“No.” He shook his head. “No...no. She can’t be-” He grabbed onto Oberyn’s shoulder, staring him right in the eyes. “She’s not dead. I would know. I’m her father. I would-” He was shaking from the chills, from the grief. He couldn’t lose his daughter. _Not so soon after Cat._ A man might expect to bury his parents, perhaps even his wife but never his children. Oberyn was talking to him but it did no good, the world seemed to vanish for Ned. There was only pain now.

“M’lord,” Tomard was saying. “M’lord, she’s not dead. I know it, I do. Remember when she went missing for three days in the Wolfswood?” 

She’d had a fight with Sansa and ran away. They combed through every inch of the wood and Ned had almost succumbed to his despair when they found her in an old crofter’s home, tending to his sheep. The memory made Ned smile in spite of the voice in his head that whispered _three days in the Wolfswood are not weeks in King’s Landing._

“We’ll find her m’lord,” Tomard said resolutely. “Arya Underfoot knows how to hide. She gave them the slip. She’s out there somewhere. I know she is.” He had been Arya’s favourite among the men in Winterfell. Desmond, Jory, Alyn and Harwin had never given in to her whims the way Tomard had. She’d named him Fat Tom and he named her Arya Underfoot. 

“I hope you’re right,” Ned said. He had no more place for loss in his heart, only rage. 

“Do you know if any one of my household made it out alive?” 

“Only Sansa,” Oberyn answered him. “There was the steward’s girl too-” 

“Jeyne Poole.” _Vayon’s daughter._ “Did you get her too?” 

“They took her away shortly after…” 

“Where is she?”

“I don’t know.” 

_One more person I failed._ Why was he still alive?

His breeches were stuck to his skin and so much harder to remove than his shirt had been. They cut them off him. Fat Tom held his breath as he moved him. His hands washed his groin and his buttocks clean. Weeks of lying in his own excrement had torn his skin to pieces leaving behind bright red patches of oozing flesh. The pain of the vinegar cleaning his wounds barely registered against the heaviness in his heart. Even the pain in his leg ceased to have meaning. His daughter was lost... _maybe dead._ His entire household put to the slaughter. What right did he have to be alive?

Fat Tom cleaned him wordlessly until time came to undo his bandages. When he lifted the leg, Ned gasped. “It hurts like the devil,” he exclaimed. 

Tom clapped a hand to his mouth, swallowing a shout. “What did they…” his voice trailed off. “M’lord,” he groaned, before stumbling away and retching. Had it not been for the situation, Ned would have laughed: his guard vomiting his innards to pieces while it was his leg that was beyond help. Ned did not even need to look at it to know. It positively stank and the faces of the men staring at him told it all.

 _Good,_ he thought. _Perhaps I will die and go to Cat’s seven hells. Others take you, Eddard Stark, for all you’ve led to their deaths._

“Drink this.” Oberyn handed him another skin. _Dornish strongwine,_ Ned realised with the taste. _I really must be dying._

“No Milk of the Poppy?” he asked. 

He received no answer, only the sting of wine against his wounds. Ned shrieked like a flayed cat, grabbed Oberyn’s hand and slumped back into the darkness. 

He woke on a small fishing boat. They’d dressed him in warm woolen breeches cut at the knee and dressed his leg. Ned remembered none of it and was glad for it. To undress a man an immobile man was easy; you just slashed his clothes off him. To get a clean shirt and breeches on him however...Feeling chills run down his spine, he wrapped the cloak tighter around himself. 

The boy from earlier sat hunched over the oars. Aron and Ser Archibald had the other oars, each man rowing them towards the dark sea. 

“Good to see you finally join us,” Prince Oberyn said, leaning against the side of the boat. He bit into an apple. 

Ned was lying against Tomard’s side. 

“Where are we going?” 

“I believe you’ve sailed upon our fair lady. You brought my sister home to Dorne on her.”

 _Davos._ Ned remembered hearing the name earlier. “Stannis’ man.”

“The very one.” 

Ned struggled to sit up. His leg throbbed with the movement but he managed it. The western sky was draped in darkness. The clouds prevented him from seeing what he searched for. 

“How long have you been planning this?” Ned asked. 

“Planning what?” 

“To place your nephew on the throne.” 

He shrugged, “Since he was a baby.” 

“What did you plan for Robert?” 

“I wanted to skewer him on the end of my spear. Unfortunately for me, cooler heads prevailed or… hotter ones if you consider Cersei Lannister’s last dash attempt to hide her secret.”

“And if he lived?” 

“He was always going to die.” 

“I’m still young,” Robert told him once. “Now that you’re here with me, things will be different. We’ll make this a reign to sing of, and damn the Lannisters to seven hells.” _Oh Robert,_ Ned thought. _Would that we stayed boys in Jon’s care, far from this game of thrones._

“How did you take Dragonstone?” he asked instead. He already knew Renly’s death had come at Cersei’s hands. “Stannis is not a man to be beaten so easily even _with_ your spies at court.” He shot the Red Keep’s Master-at-arms a pointed look.

Oberyn bit into his apple again. “He was dead by the time we got there.” 

“You had him killed.” 

“Dale,” Oberyn said to the boy. “Tell Lord Stark what happened to your lord.” 

The boy, the Onion Knight’s eldest, told Ned how a rabid dog brought an end to Stannis’ life. _A boar had brought an end to Robert’s._

“As for his ships....well, we had more.” Oberyn chewed. “I suppose we have you to thank for that.” 

“Me?” 

“Who did you think you were selling the lumber to?” 

Ned almost laughed. “Stannis’ daughter?” he asked. 

“Alive and hale.” 

“She is Robert’s heir.” 

“She is Lady Shireen Baratheon, a Martell by marriage now and the rightful Lady of Storm’s End. No more. She will tell you that herself.”

“She is a child and afraid.” 

“She is wise and alive...which is more than I could say for you had my sister not given _me_ the impossible task of keeping you alive. What in seven hells possessed you to tell the woman of what you knew?”

“Knowing what befell your sister, are you really asking me?”

“Knowing what befell my sister, why did you agree to serve the man?” 

_Robert was not the monster you think he was_ , Ned thought. _He was complicated...he was my brother._ He felt his eyes well. “I needed to know who killed Jon Arryn.” 

“Do you know now?” 

“Aye.” The word tasted bitter in his mouth. Lysa Arryn had thrown his family to the lions and killed the man Ned loved as much as his own father. She would pay. Her and her lover. “What now?” 

“Aegon takes what is his.” 

Ned listened in silence as Oberyn told him of the boy’s rescue, and of the months Elia spent not knowing what became of her child. Ned was so overcome by his own grief when Elia pleaded with him to let the three knights of the Kingsguard go. She promised him they would be dead to the world. He had been so sure they would make their last stand on Dragonstone, that he would be proven a liar if he said they’d died in Dorne. Elia had only smiled at him and said, “ _They will not go to Dragonstone...They made a vow to protect Rhaegar’s son._ _They will protect Jon by staying away.”_

_They protected their king and raised him in Essos._

“The news Varys brought of him,” Ned said, linking the threads together. He remembered wondering why they only spoke of Ashara and Jon Connington, people he was sure were dead and not those who knew had been alive when he last saw them. “There was no mention of them…it was you.”

Oberyn grinned. “My brother makes no step he hasn’t considered ten times over. We wanted to know what you would do.”  
“And I did as you expected?” 

“You did more than we’d hoped if I’m honest.”

“If I didn’t, you would use what you knew to break me from Robert. Is that it?” 

To his credit, Oberyn Martell held Ned’s eyes. “I’d be happy to,” he said. “But Elia would kill me as surely as Robert would you. Still,” he sighed. “I doubt it’s a secret anymore.” 

The words turned the air in Ned’s lungs to lead, dragging him down. 

“Aegon wrote to Winterfell.”

“What?”

Fat Tom shot Ned a questioning look. Ned ignored it. “He had no right.” Ned said through gritted teeth.  
“He has as much right as you do.”

“Jon is my-”

“Nephew. He is Aegon’s brother.” 

Tom gasped beside him. 

Ned sank into himself. “What did he say?” 

“He told your son of the blood that ties them together in the wars to come.” 

Aegon’s High Hill disappeared into the sea mists. His Arya was there somewhere. The craven that he was, was leaving her there. His little girl. _I brought her here. She didn’t want to come._ Ned could only stare unseeing. 

Darkness surrounded him and ate at his innards. He had hoped to tell Jon. Deep in his cavernous cell, he had made the decision to tell him, had even thought of what he might say and this... _boy_ had taken the right from him. 

A silent two-masted blot in the darkness, Davos’ smuggling ship lay waiting. They dropped a rope ladder over the side. Tom stood on unsteady sea legs and helped Ned up. Ser Aron climbed up before him. Oberyn followed. They tied Ned to Ser Archibald once more. The pain was still there but this time it was dulled by the strongwine. Aron Santagar and Oberyn waited up the rail to pull him up to the deck. 

“Father!” Sansa came running into him and crashed into his chest. 

He removed his arm from Oberyn’s shoulder to the bandage tied around her head. “What happened?” 

“Nymeria hit me.” 

“She was screaming for help and drawing attention to us,” Oberyn’s daughter explained nonchalantly. “It was either leave her there or silence her. I didn’t think the former was an option so…” She shrugged. 

Sansa shot her a raging look. “She killed Ser Mandon, Father, and she killed a red cloak and she-” 

Ned looked at the girl in question. _Arya had liked her._ “Did she?” He looked at his daughter once more. 

She nodded.

“Good,” Ned said, remembering the way the man had cut through his men in the throne room. 

Sansa gasped. “Good? Father, she _killed_ him.” 

“It’s what he deserved.” Ned took a hold of her right hand, then her left, looking for a missing finger, of any injuries on her body. There were none he could see. 

She looked at him confused. “Father, we have to go back! We can’t just leave like this. They’ll think you really _are_ a traitor if we leave like this. We have to go back. I spoke to Joffrey and the queen. They know you’re not a traitor. I’m going to marry Joffrey and when I’m queen he will have to let you go because you’re my father and-” 

“Where’s your sister?” Ned interjected, unable to listen anymore, squeezing her shoulder. Once he might have listened to her, reasoned, explained. He had neither the patience nor the will just now. 

With a startled gasp she said, “Arya is...I thought she went home.” 

Ned grimaced, a mixture of rage and disgust flowing through him. Mainly it was leveled at himself but also at his clueless daughter. “You thought?” 

“I-”

“Did you ask?” 

“I…” she stuttered. “I thought she might have gotten on the ship like you wanted. She wasn’t in the castle and I-”  
“You might have been on that ship too,” Ned carped. “Had you not…” He closed his eyes. A spark of anger flared in him. “Where’s Jeyne Poole?” 

“Oh,” she answered with some relief. “Lord Baelish took her to her father. Do you know where they went?”

Ned gritted his teeth. When he opened his eyes he noticed the other people on deck, all looking at them. Among them was Ser Barristan Selmy.

“What are _you_ doing here?” Ned demanded. The man had just stood there as his king’s words were torn apart and Ned’s men killed around him. “Or have you been planning for your true king’s return as well?” 

“I didn’t know the prince had survived, my lord. Not until it was mentioned in council.” 

“Joffrey dismissed him so he could give his dog the cloak,” Oberyn explained. “Varys brought him to me.”

“Where _is_ Varys?”

“He still has business in King’s Landing.”

“Had I known what you all knew then, I would have gone to him years ago,” Ser Barristan went on. “Had I known you let my brothers live-”

“He didn’t _let_ them live,” Oberyn lilted with annoyance. “Do you think so little of the men you call brothers that they’d be killed by a bunch of…” He ran his gaze up and down Ned’s form. “...northerners,” he finished. 

Ned turned to look at him. 

“What?” he asked. 

“It’s good to see you again, my lord” Ser Davos said, coming into the fray. 

“And you,” Ned replied. 

“Milord,” another voice said. 

Ned had to strain to see her in the dark but her light red hair in the torchlight jogged his memory. The child was at her breast now as then. “Thank you,” she said nervously, “for getting us out of there.” 

Ned turned to Oberyn again. “Cersei was going to have them killed,” he explained. “Varys said they were proof of your...findings.” 

Barra’s mother stood there looking at him with a thankful smile. Not far from her was a boy of an age with Bran, two girls were slightly older than him, all of them black of hair and blue of eye. Sitting on a crate with a smouldering look on his face was the boy Gendry. He looked so much like Robert did at his age that Ned could cry. 

“It’s not me you should be thanking,” Ned told the girl. She was scarcely older than Sansa was. _She was a child, Robert._

“Thank you,” he said to Oberyn, voice thick with emotion as he remembered the promise he made to his friend. ‘ _I shall … guard your children as if they were my own.’_

_Thank you for not letting me break another oath._

“Father-” Sansa squeaked. “You have to listen to me. We have to go back-” 

“Enough!” Ned barked. The shock of it caused her to jump. “I will not hear you speak of that boy or his mother again.”

“But Father, I am to marry-“

“Enough!”

There was only one small cabin on the ship besides the one assigned to the children on the ship. The Redwyne twins, he learnt when he came below deck, were also aboard and sleeping tied together in the companionway between the two cabins. They were taken to ensure Cersei could not use their father’s ships against Aegon’s fleet when the time came. _You have been busy,_ Ned thought as Oberyn stepped over them.

He took supper in the cabin, his first true meal in weeks, and drank more than he should. They had black bread, saltbeef with onions and the chickpea paste that came with every Dornish meal he’d ever had. When he was done, Oberyn demanded to see the leg. 

The storm was picking up ahead, roaring and beating down on the ship with hard rain. He heard Davos instructing the men above to lower the sails. With these winds, failure to do so was to risk the mast being ripped from the boards. The twins awoke with the heaving of the ship. 

Faintly, he could hear Ser Archibald heaving outside the cabin. 

“He’s not good with ships,” Ser Aron explained. “His father wasn’t any better either.” 

Tomard placed him upon the oak desk he ate on just minutes before. The sea rose to dizzying heights beneath them. The ship rode swells tens of feet high, carrying them up to terrifying peaks and then dropping them suddenly into a trough. The chairs in the room were nailed to the floorboards but the small pallet was smashed against the walls, dragging one way and then the other. Any conversation they might have had was swallowed by roaring winds. With it went any look they might have had at his leg. The strongwine seemed to have done its job. Ned could scarcely feel his leg. _Did you feel this numb, Robert?_

Tom held Ned in place. The wine made his head spin or was it the fever? He didn’t care anymore. 

“Sansa!” he cried out. 

“I have her,” Ser Aron shouted back though it sounded like a whisper.

Most of the people on the ship went up to the deck, grabbing on to whatever they could. He could hear Barra’s cry. As wet and windy as it was up there, it must have been better than the darkness that engulfed them below deck as the lamps were dimmed. The waves tossed what was left in the bare room to and fro. 

Tom never let him go once. 

The pink boys had fought. His white son’s companion slunk off in a rage. The red-furred one returned to lead the bulk of the horses over the man cave. There were thousands of men with each of them, steel claws in hand and wings of every shade. He went ahead of them all. He could sense his daughter here somewhere. Her howls seemed closer. Leagues and leagues they marched before he heard her howl for true. She was on the other side of the wide river. He returned her call. _I hear you. I am here._ His neck prickled with the sound he _didn’t_ hear but knew his son tried to make in answer. He would find her. He knew _he_ would find her. In the distance he heard the wood whisper. 

The small room was positively cramped when Ned awoke the next morning. He woke to hammering pain in his leg and at his back. He was still lying on the desk and could see a pale spring sun filter through the hatches. Oberyn was unwinding the bandages from Ned’s leg. He sat up. Hot white pain pulsed through him. 

“I need more wine.” It was a relief not to feel last night.

He looked down at his leg, seeing it for the first time in months. Even as groggy as he was, the stink of gangrene was unmistakable and just in case he had any misgivings, the greenish tinge to his leg put to rest any doubts he might have had. 

Oberyn had clearly reached the same conclusion when his eyes met Ned’s. “I have to…”  
“No.” 

“It’s a miracle you’re alive, Lord Eddard. If I don’t do this now-”

“Then I will die _with_ my leg.” He’d already accepted death’s embrace in his cell. _Let it end._

“What use is a leg to a dead man?” 

“I’d rather die intact than live with half a leg.” The truth was Ned Stark was a craven. He’d been to war. He’d seen men die from the treatment as much as they did from the wound. He saw field maesters burn wounds shut with boiling oil, and listened as the men screamed themselves into a stupor only to die later feverish with pain or because of swelling in their wounds. 

“And your children?” Oberyn asked. “They’ve already lost their mother. Would you have them lose their father as well?” 

_Cat._

“Nymeria,” Oberyn cried out to his daughter. “Bring me some hot water, and some honey.” He fingered some herbs and put them in a bowl. 

“Do you even know what you are doing?”

He was holding a knife over the fire in the lamp, turning it. “I earned my healing link at the citadel. I know what to do...in theory. First I have to cut these,” he said, pointing out some wounds on Ned’s good leg. 

Ned slumped down. “What for? I’m dying anyway.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it.” 

Ned’s breath whistled in and out of his mouth. He grit his teeth when Oberyn sank the knife into the first swell. Puss oozed out, welling from swell after swell. 

He inspected the wound for more abscesses and poured vinegar over it. Ned inhaled and squeezed his eyes tightly shut. Oberyn dressed the wounds with honey and wrapped the leg with a warm poultice that smelt strongly on onion and garlic. 

He then turned his attention to the crippled leg.

“Leave it,” Ned said. “There’s nothing to do for it.”

“Elia-“

“You’ve done your bit,” he said irritably. The man had talked him to sleep about how highly his sister thought of Ned and how he had to save him for her. “Are you to blame for what befell my leg?”

Oberyn stopped examining the leg for a moment and considered Ned with a burgeoning smile. “When you see them…” He raised the knife. “Make sure that’s the first thing you tell them...I haven’t spoken to Elia since I left Winterfell but she and Ashara seem to be of one mind on most things. Since Ashara blames me for what happened to your leg…” he paused for a moment to pour the hot water Nymeria brought into the bowl. “‘ _The Kingslayer wouldn’t have attacked him if he was still Hand,’”_ Oberyn said in a high voice. 

For the first time in what felt like forever, Ned laughed. The croaking sound felt foreign to his ears.

“If I let you die, one would hold me down as the other gelds me.”

“She’s alive then.”

It was the first confirmation he’d had of the news Varys brought months ago. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Oberyn turned away from him to steep his herbs. “The world had to believe she was dead.”

 _I’m not the world,_ Ned thought. _I should have known._ Once again he found himself wondering what became of her these past seventeen years. Had she married? Did she have children of her own? He couldn’t find it in him to ask. 

Sansa stepped into the cabin. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and her face the same colour. Ned’s heart dropped at the sight. 

“What’s wrong, sweetling?” he asked, anger forgotten. He placed a blanket over his leg.

“Are you going to lose your leg?”

He looked down at the limb in question. “Come here,” he told his frightened daughter and held her close. 

“I want you to live,” she whispered. “You _have_ to live. Mother’s gone and-“ she sobbed against his chest. 

He looked down at the leg again. _I will never be able to take the field again or do anything that required two whole legs. I’ll never run after Rickon or go hunting with my sons._

He kissed her brow. 

Tomard ushered her out of the room. Oberyn ordered him out, saying he wouldn’t have him be sick again. Ser Aron replaced him. They were joined by Ser Daemon Sand and Oberyn’s daughter Nymeria. 

“My daughter,” Ned said.

“We’ll take her home, I promise.”

“And Arya-“

“And Arya too. We’ll avenge her if we can’t.” He handed Ned a leather strip. “Bite down on this.”

Oberyn wrapped a tight band around his thigh, twisting it with a stick to tighten it before placing another two lower down his leg. One was tied just under his knee. The tightened bands seemed to reduce the pain somewhat. 

“Drink, my lord,” the girl his children called Lady Nym said. He drank every last drop and lay down.

He screamed. The pain took him under. He didn’t hear his leg thump down, severed for good.

The rest of the journey was a blur. Now and again small bubbles of lucidity would pop through his brain. Sansa at his side singing and praying to her mother’s gods, Tom sitting him up to place a cup to his mouth. It was honey water or broth most of the time but now and again some wine. Oberyn would be there too sometimes, slapping his face, urging him to answer and changing the bandages. Somewhere along the way the wood at his back was replaced by a featherbed and he could hear the clinks of a maester’s chain. 

Then he heard a baby cry and he was back with Lyanna in her bed of blood. 

Sometimes she lived though. She’d get up, clean herself and they’d leave the tower together. Father and Brandon would be waiting for them in Winterfell. He saw himself wandering the green fields with Lyanna, sparring with Brandon under Father’s keen eye. He saw himself laughing as he drank with Robert and Elbert Arryn while Jon looked for them. Sometimes he saw Cat too. 

Sometimes he would see her standing there, dagger in her gut, blood spilling from her mouth and he would scream soundlessly. He was back in the Vale, climbing up the Eyrie, _Ice_ in hand. Cat screamed behind him. 

On other occasions, she’d call him to their bed. “My love,” she’d say to him. “Come to me.”

“Cat,” he’d whisper, walking over to her. “I thought I’d never see you again.” She’d disappear before he could touch her.

Then suddenly Ashara would be there lying beside him, black of hair, violet of eye and his as she was that night in Gulltown. He would make her all the promises in the world - of the children they’d have and the home they’d build for themselves. Then he’d be alone again. 

This time was different though. She came to him again but she was different, older but all the more beautiful for it. She walked toward him, skirts rustling as they brushed the floor. Her purple gown was well-tailored and cinched in at her waist. Full-bosomed as she was, he could see the velvety flesh swelling above her low cut neckline. She smelt of roses and violets. 

“Ashara,” he said wondrously when the bed dipped to hold her weight. “I dreamt of you, Ash. For so many years I searched for you in the stars.”

He jerked bolt upright when he felt a soft hand on his cheek and let out a yell of distress when the movement jarred his leg. It was gone. Everything from beneath his knee was gone but he couldn’t see it covered as he was with quilts. 

“Ned,” the soft hand on his cheek said. “Oh, Ned.” Her voice was shaky and she had tears in her eyes. She was really there, sitting beside him. 

“My lady.” He straightened his shirt. 

She placed the edge of a cup against his lips. It was something he hadn’t tasted before. It was herby and had none of the nutty taste of milk of the poppy.

“For the fever,” she explained as if she could read his mind.

He watched her, noting all the changes in her, as she held his head and gave him the drink. She had never been fat, but any chubbiness of girlhood that was left in her had vanished. Her cheekbones were sharper and her bosom fuller but her eyes were still as intoxicating as he remembered, and her full lips still formed the shape of an archer’s bow. He could see a hint of rose flooding her cheeks when their eyes met. Tendrils of her black hair framed her face. Before he knew what he was doing, he moved them out of her face. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter feels like a filler but I needed a transit chapter as Ned’s next one takes place over a few weeks & it didn’t work quite as well without a transition. 
> 
> It also taught me more than I needed to know about gangrene and medieval amputations. I’d hoped to save Ned’s leg but the more I thought about it, the less likely it seemed he would come out of this intact. He’d been stewing in his own...juices, shall we say, for over eight weeks. It’s a surprise he didn’t die in his cell tbh. Sorry Ned. At least it’s a leg and not your head…Charge it to the Lannisters.
> 
> We know of characters with disabilities and prosthetics in the books who manage to still do the things Ned fears he will never get a chance to do again. Spare Boot defends Castle Black against the wildling attack despite his wooden leg. Ned might’ve preferred to keep his leg but it’s not the end of his world as a lord/commander of an army. 
> 
> I think Robert will always be Ned’s blind spot. In the books when he meets Barra’s mother he’s too scared to ask her age because she’s so young. Even when he can’t explain away Robert’s actions, he finds it so hard to not be defensive of him because he’s so keen to hold on to the memory of the boy who had once been his brother. Call it true love or another character flaw. I think it’s both. 
> 
> He might come across as too soft on Sansa but I think it’s a mixture of him being drunk, bone tired and grieving. She’s also lost her mother and I think that plays into his embracing her when he’s about to lose his leg. As angry as he is, I think his papa feelings come to the fore. They’ll have a proper conversation later. 
> 
> In my original outline, I had Oberyn telling Ned he married Ashara just to pull his leg but I couldn’t find anywhere to include that kind of comic relief given the way the chapter progressed. 
> 
> For two men who have nothing else in common, Ned and Oberyn are linked by their love for their sisters. I can’t wait to see how their relationship progresses. 
> 
> I’m not sure after 17 years apart, Ned ever thought he’d babble to her in a feverish state about how he was looking for her in the stars. Damn fever spoiling his game 😂
> 
> Next we have a short Elia chapter as she sends another husband off to a battle along The Trident.


	46. Elia

**Elia**

Ser Raymund Darry was dead. The news was old by the time she heard it but it lay heavy upon Elia’s heart. His older brother Ser Willem had helped raise her boy. His other brother Ser Jonothor had been bosom friends with her uncle Lewyn. Ser Gerold and Lady Mariya Frey were the only other people in the hall who truly felt the weight of the news. Both men had been brothers to Ser Gerold. All three had been Lady Mariya’s brothers in truth. 

They came upon her home just as the sun dipped out of sight. Merrett Frey’s holdfast was the only fortress, the only building truth be told, for miles. The surrounding terrain was flat to the west, mountainous to the east and uninhabited like most of the lands south of The Twins and north of The Ruby Ford. Though they focused the majority of their attentions upon those travelling the High Road - _people like Catelyn Stark_ \- the clans of the Mountains of the Moon were also known to raid merchants and travellers here as well. Whether or not they saw them, they did not come out of their bolt holes to harass them. They could not raid a host as large as this.

Though a Frey by marriage, Mariya held the Targaryen sympathies of her brothers before her. Raymund had died waiting for the day that House Darry would get back the standing they lost when Robert came upon the throne. While her Westerlands-raised husband, a cousin to the Lord of Crakehall, was pushing his father to side with Tywin, Mariya housed twenty of Oswell’s men in her holdfast. The men were sent ahead to see to Elia’s safety - a gesture Ethan found insulting. 

“You’re _my_ wife,” he fumed. “Does he mean to say _I_ can’t protect you?” 

Among the group was a messenger who’d arrived just that morning. Tywin Lannister had chosen an inn on the Crossroads as his base aiming to cut their approach on the only crossing south of The Twins. _Just as we expected._ Os was stationed near Castle Darry, just south of him, cutting off Tywin’s news from the south while Arthur led the van down the Kingsroad from the recaptured Harrenhal. Jon Connington was marching with a host to Lord Harroway’s Town to Tywin’s west while a small Dornish host led by Ser Deziel Dalt was to sail up the Widow’s Ford. Marq Piper and Karyl Vance were also loose in Tywin’s rear, raiding the Lannister supply lines across the Red Fork. The men Ned had sent north were also a nuisance hounding Tywin as he marched. 

All of this should have pleased Elia. _It does._ Yet as Lady Mariya hosted the northern lords in her hall, Elia could not help but fidget in her seat with nerves strung taut. She was sending another husband to a battle on The Trident and now as then, her fear was accompanied by an aching loneliness. Ethan sat across from her on the u-shaped dais. There were only a few feet between them but it could have been leagues. Though things had thawed between them somewhat, they were still far from true reconciliation. Some days he rode beside her on the march. On the day the bulk of their cavalry crossed The Twins, he even slowed his destrier to match the pace of her palfrey’s and extended his hand to her. She took it and they rode with entwined fingers for some time, his grip warm and comforting but that was all. When night came he shared her tent as he always did but not her furs. Never her furs. He was always nearby, hovering around her as a silent, protective presence. It was comforting at first but now only reminded her of what she lost - love she knew she would never receive from him again. _I should have made my peace with this by now._

Come morning she would have to watch him ride out, perhaps never to return again. It was one thing to live as they did now, distant and aloof but together. It was another thing entirely to have to stay behind these walls while he went to look death in the face where Rhaegar had fallen. _Where Uncle Lewyn fell._

“Princess, if you would excuse me,” Ser Gerold said. “I would speak to the messenger again before retiring.” 

“Of course.” Elia squeezed his hand. “Goodnight, Ser Gerold.” 

She tore the hunk of bread in her hands into tiny pieces. The ache lodged in her throat meant she could not swallow anything larger. She looked around the tables. Ethan was sitting with Trystane across from her. Beside him was Roose Bolton busy in conversation with Lady Mariya and her daughter Walda, a short but very _large_ girl with watery eyes. 

Her sister, Amerei, slimmer and more sprightly focused her attention squarely on Jon. 

“Tell me about Winterfell,” she was saying now with a hand placed over his. Her own husband Ser Pate was sitting just beside her. She had her back to him. “My brother has never been further north than The Twins. Do you think…” she leaned forward and fluttered her eyelashes. “Do you think once the war is over you could show me Winterfell?” 

“Her maid told Jayne they call her Gatehouse-Ami,” Arianne whispered.

“They say she raises her portcullis for every knight who happens by,” Jayne Ladybright added. 

Shireen giggled and covered her mouth just as Elia was about to tell them off for speaking of Mariya’s daughter so. Stannis’ daughter seldom spoke in Elia’s presence, much less laughed so she let the matter go. It was nice to see the girl coming out of her shell. _Good thing Jon’s plan didn’t work,_ Elia thought as she watched her giggling. Had Jon Arryn gotten his way and seen Elia married to Stannis the poor girl would never have been born. 

“Seems she’s taken a liking to Jon. Someone should tell her the boy’s as big a prude as a septon. Are you sure he’s not...” 

“He is not,” Elia found herself saying. _There was that Forrester girl Ethan mentioned._

“He looks like he’d rather be anywhere but here.” 

About _that_ , Arianne was right. He answered the girl curtly and rose to leave. Perhaps things between him and the Forrester girl were more serious than Elia thought. 

Sweetheart or no, Jon had been in a black mood for days. If Arianne was to be believed it was because he and Robb had argued about the arrangement to betroth Arya to the Frey boy. When Elia broached the subject with him he simply said, “Arya won’t like him.” She would think that was all there was to it, until she caught Jon shooting daggers at the boy across the fire one night. 

“He called Larence a bastard,” Arianne explained. Queen her niece may become one day but Elia thought her more suited to the job of a spymaster. Nothing happened in camp - big or small - without her knowing _something_ about it. 

Elia followed Jon out. They walked around the camp for a while talking of everything and nothing when the night air was filled with the spine-tingling song of wolves. 

Elia looked for Ghost. He wasn’t nearby and in any case never made a sound. The horses whickered nervously. Dogs barked. Jon ran towards the sound of the howling. Elia followed. 

Cayn, one of the Winterfell men, was standing sentry. “Let them through!” 

They came leaping through the entrance and galloped towards Jon. The blur of grey crashed into his front. He bent down to hug the wolf. 

“Nymeria!” he shouted happily. “Nymeria!”

The wolf licked his face almost joyously. Ghost ran around them, his own tail wagging. 

Men stopped to watch the spectacle. 

“Where’s Arya, girl?” He asked the wolf. “Do you know where she is?” 

As if in conversation with him the wolf whined. 

“Is she alright?” 

She licked his face, tail wagging, barking as if she was a puppy and not larger than most of the ponies in their company. 

“What’s this?” He wiped his hand on her snout and then rubbed his thumb over his fingers. Elia moved closer to see it was blood. 

“Was it you girl?” He asked her, stroking his hand through her fur. “Have you been picking them off?” 

Nymeria barked and Jon laughed before burying his face in her fur. 

The barber was leaving Ethan’s tent when Elia got there. Lady Mariya had offered them her solar but Ethan had declined saying he didn’t think it right that he should sleep on a featherbed while his men slept on straw and grass.

He’d trimmed his beard and had his hair shaved since leaving the feast. “It was growing to be a nuisance under the helmet,” he explained when she commented on it. 

“We leave just after dawn,” he told Larence. 

The boy grinned, cheeks flushed with the excitement of squiring for his lord in battle. 

“Go get some sleep.” 

“I will my lord.” He looked around as if searching for something. “I have most of your things ready, but I can’t find your quilted tunic and I know that it needed mending.” 

“Here.” Elia rummaged through her own chest and pulled out Ethan’s quilted leather tunic. She’d stuffed the leather with wool and mended the tear. 

Larence shot her a thankful grin. He was adequate with a needle but hated having to come anywhere near one.

“I have something for you as well,” Elia said, before producing a smaller gambeson for him embroidered with the iron glove of House Glover. The boy was Lord Hornwood’s natural son but with the heir to Hornwood travelling with them and the boy’s mother not being overly fond of Larence, Elia thought it best that she didn’t embroider the bullmoose on the tunic. 

He dropped the chainmail he was holding and embraced her fiercely. 

“You heard your lord,” she laughed. “Get to bed. You have a long march ahead of you.” 

“But I have to-” 

“I will do whatever your lord requires.” 

He looked at her unsurely. 

“Go on.” 

“If that’s all, my lord.” 

“It is,” Elia answered. 

“Goodnight, my lord.” 

“Goodnight Larence.”

He walked away, looked at the tunic in his hands again and ran to Elia, pulling her into another bone-crushing hug before he left the tent. 

He left her laughing. Ethan joined her. He averted his gaze when their eyes met and sat down to remove his boots. The ensuing silence was charged with a tense undercurrent.

“Ghost found Arya’s wolf.” 

He looked up then with a look of surprise. 

“She appeared at the edge of the camp with a pack of wolves. Jon’s convinced that it’s her who's been plaguing Tywin’s outriders.”

“I would expect nothing less of a wolf belonging to Ned’s hell-raiser,” he laughed before adding more somberly. “I hope we find her too.” 

“Me too.” The silence around her whereabouts discomfited Elia. King’s Landing was not a place where lone girls survived without protection. More than once tonight as Merrett Frey bragged about helping Arthur defeat the Smiling Knight - he did not - she thought of Arya. Wenda the White Fawn had been a heroine of hers and Merrett had been one of the highborn captives on whose arse she branded a fawn. 

Elia walked around the tent, running her fingers over Ethan’s helmet and his chainmail and then the folded linen tunic above his chest of belongings. She unfolded it immediately upon recognising the two E’s along the cuff. When she held it up she was greeted with the entwined sun and spear of her home and the silver first of House Glover where his heart would be. It was the tunic she’d finished sewing for him the day news of Aegon came to their home. 

He was sitting on the woven pallet, looking at her intently, bright gazed. 

Like a fool she still held the tunic outstretched. “You plan to wear this on the morrow?” 

“Yes.” It was only a twitch of the lips but she saw the smile.

“Does this mean you do not want to set me aside?” It was stupid question. It was just a tunic. 

He stood then and walked over to her. “I told you.” He took the tunic from her hands and laid it above the chest. “I won’t set you aside. I’ve never wanted that. Even at my angriest, I never wanted to set you aside.” He put his arms around her, close enough for her to feel the warmth of his embrace but far enough for her to still be able to look him in the eyes. “I married you for as long as I shall live… which,” he added with a chuckle, “might not be very long if Tywin should have his way.” 

“Ethan-” she tried to put into words her desolation. “I don’t want-” _What?_ “I-” She groped for the proper words but they all seemed to lodge themselves in her throat. They gazed into each other's eyes but Elia found she could not command her limbs to move or her mouth to speak. Ethan’s expression was unguarded, tender even. It was so different from the look he had on his face the last time they spoke of him setting her aside. That night he looked at her without any softness - the way he might have looked in battle going from enemy to enemy, cutting one down and moving to the next. 

Elia swallowed hard, trying hard to dislodge the lump that seemed stuck in her throat. She loved him, missed him, wanted him. 

She exhaled deeply, not quite in relief. “Will you ever love me again?” 

“Elia.” He put two fingers under her chin and brushed her lips with his - a ghost of a kiss really. He tightened his hold around her and she molded herself to him. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, crying in earnest now. “I’m sorry. I-” She gulped. “I don’t want to be without you anymore. I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness and that I’m not a good-” 

He didn’t let her finish whatever she was going to say, silencing her with his mouth. “Look at me,” he murmured. 

Tears stung her eyes. 

“I love you, Elia Martell...Glover,” he added with a smile. “I love you more than any man has ever loved a woman.” 

She didn’t respond, couldn’t, not with words anyway. She never thought she would hear those words again. He’d whispered them to her so many times over the years but it had been so long since she last heard them. She pressed herself tightly against him, burying her face against his chest and sobbed. 

“You might want to save those tears for when I’m dead,” he laughed.

“That’s not funny!” She hit him in the chest. It was a fear she could not even put into words. “If you die, I’ll die with you.” 

“Then I suppose I must live.”

Ethan walked her over to the pallet and began undressing her slowly as if they had all the time in the world in a never-ending night. She did the same for him. When they kissed though, it was as if it was the last night in the world and they were running out of time. She could taste their mingled tears. His hands stole around her back squeezing and kneading and pressing her against his insistent desire. 

“Touch me,” he whispered, taking her hand and placing it on his chest. “My heart beats for you, Elia.” He kissed her neck. “I don’t want to be without you anymore either.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“I know, love. Me too.” He swept her into his arms and laid her down softly on his pallet. She was as naked as the day she was born and very aware of his dark eyes running up and down her body. She was on fire.

“Ethan.” She rubbed her foot up his leg, stopping where his thighs met his manhood. “Join me.”

He did. He kissed her neck, her right breast, then the hollow between her breasts. He brushed a finger over her left nipple. It hardened under his burning touch, making him smile. His gaze was so piercing that when he looked up at her she looked away as if she was a shy bride deposited upon a new husband’s bed. 

“Look at me,” he whispered. “Look at me as I love you.”

He kissed her stomach, then moved lower, rubbing his face against her. The hair of his beard tickled the skin between her thighs. Then his hands were on her hips holding her down and his fingers and mouth where she thought she would never have him again. So many weeks without him, so many nights never quite coming to terms with never having him this close again - his weight, his warmth, his lips, his fingers. She closed her eyes seeing stars of every shade. 

“Look at me,” he whispered against that place most sensitive. “Look at me love you.” His slow, long, steady movements made that impossible. She threw her head back and gripped the furs as if she was holding on for her life. A few more seconds and her body rose off the bed. Then she fell apart like shards of dazzling glass. 

“Please.” She pushed him down, wanting to give him as much as he’d given her. He lay back on the straw-filled bed, fingers through her hair as she touched and kissed him, tasting herself on him. He quivered, his buttocks tensed. He begged her to join with him, holding her steady as she sank down on him. His eyes never left hers. He took her to dizzying heights again and again and again, holding himself back, stopping, groaning, gasping but not quite willing to let it end not until she begged him to join her there. He rose and held her tight against him. It was only a few more thrusts before he did, mouth locked over hers in a silent shout. 

“I never thought we’d get to do that again,” she confessed, still joined with him as he softened inside her. She lay her forehead against his still catching her breath. 

“Was it good?” He smiled at her and twisted a loose curl around his finger. Her chest was still heaving. A sheen of sweat covered his. 

“It always is with you.” 

When they lay down he drew her to lie as close to him as she could. Her bottom nestled snugly against his groin. His hand stroked her stomach.

“You gave birth to a good boy.”

She twisted round to face him. 

“I’m sure Ari told you he wrote to me.”

Elia smiled. “She did. What did he say?” She had been too scared to broach the subject with him.

Ethan inhaled loudly. “He apologised for crimes that were not his.” Then he let the breath out. “As for the rest…” He stroked her flank, “That is between me and my new son.”

Elia sat up. “Your new son?”

“Is he not yours?”

Elia swallowed. 

“And are you not my wife?”

She nodded.

“What is yours is mine, Elia. Your secrets, your hardships, your family. Just as you made mine yours.”

A tear came from the side of her eye. 

“I’m sorry for being so hard on you...for not trying to understand you.”

“I’m sorry for lying to you.”

“Never lie to me again.”

“I promise.”

They lay close together for a while, him holding her in his arms. His fingers teased at her hair, her face. Hers did the same as if she was trying to etch the memory of him with her fingers deep in her soul.

“I think he’ll make a good king,” he said. “Ser Gerold speaks highly of him.”

“Do you forgive him…Ser Gerold?” Years ago Ethan had told her of his resentful feelings against all the men who were present the day Rickard and Brandon Stark died. Ser Gerold was chief among them. “He was this great man we were told. Brave, honourable, just and he just stood there.”

For a long while Ethan didn’t answer. “It’s not for me to forgive,” he said. “But I see now how hard it is to choose between your duty and what’s right.” Elia wasn’t sure if he was speaking about himself or the White Bull.

“I was so scared you might not like Egg,” she said. “I was so fearful I would have to choose between you.”

“A mother’s choice is clear.”

“But a wife’s is not easy.”

“I suppose I’m glad for you that you will not have to choose, princess.”

That made her laugh. 

“I can’t say what he’s grown up to be is due to me,” she confessed much later. “Arthur and Os, Ser Gerold and Lemore, even Jon Connington...these are the people who raised him, who taught him right from wrong. They gave up years of their lives to get him here. And Ashara.” She sighed. “Sometimes I fear when he thinks of the word mother, he thinks of Ashara first and not me. She was there for his first words and his first steps.” She bit her lip to stop herself from crying. “I shouldn’t envy her. I am so grateful to her. I will never be able to repay her but I’m so jealous too.” She had never said those words to anyone, she’d never even admitted them to herself. 

Elia woke later in the night, when dawn was little more than a faint promise. She rolled to her side to study him with a knotted gut. He would leave with the morning. He looked so unburdened in his sleep, young even. Sometimes she forgot that he was not yet forty to her four-and-forty years. He had loved her through her darkest times and now that her own sun was rising, she was sending him off to war. 

“You’re thinking too loud.”

She burrowed her face into his chest. “I’m scared.”

“I know.” He rested his chin on her head, and they lay like that for some time, tightly entwined. His heartbeat thudded steadily below her ear. 

“Elia, if I…” He cleared his throat. “Should I fall...”

“No.” She put a finger to his lips. “Don’t tempt fate.” 

He raised himself on his elbow. “We must speak of this. We can’t ignore life’s dark realities.”

She was just about to open her mouth when he waved her quiet. 

“I may die, Elia, as men do when armies meet.”

“Not you.” _Not on The Trident._

He smiled faintly. “But I may.”

“If you don’t return to me, I’ll come looking for you. I’ll kill your killer and I’ll-“ He put a finger on her lips. 

“If I don’t return, ride back for The Twins. I don’t trust Walder Frey but Halys is there. He’ll give you more men, go north. Find Howland. Tywin Lannister will never find you there. Wait the end of the war in The Neck. When it’s done Aegon will come and get you.”

She stared at him.

“I sent word back with Ser Oswell’s messenger. If we lose-“

“You won’t!” He looked tired, she realised suddenly. There was every chance that he hadn’t slept much and she felt all the more guilty for waking him. She pulled him close to her, holding him next to her heart and whispered endlessly about her love for him and her knowledge that he would return to her. “We’ll raise Aegon and Arianne’s children together,” she was saying when she heard him snore. She held him to her long after he drifted off to sleep. She wanted nothing more than to hold him here, far from battlefields, from ruthless men like Tywin Lannister and from death itself. 

The morning dawned clear and cool. She could hear squires dressing their lords in armour while others tended to the few horses they had with them. When she shooed Larence away, insisting on dressing her husband herself, she saw groups of archers cradling their longbows, silently awaiting orders. 

She was so desperate to extend these last precious moments for as long as she could. She tightened the drawstrings of his breeches, knelt to help with his boots and fastened the greaves around his shins. 

Neither of them spoke but his eyes seemed to be burning into her skin. She ate him too with her eyes. 

Next, she helped him into his tunic, stroking their entwined sigils with her hands and then into his quilted tunic with the Glover arms and his full suit of mail. When she was done, she took a step back to look at him. 

He tugged on her hair. “A lock to take with me.” His voice was hoarse.

She simply nodded, unable to speak and snipped off a curl with the shears the barber had forgotten the night before. Wordlessly, she tied it with one of her silver ribbons and handed it to him. 

He gripped her hand and crushed her against him forcefully. She cried as he kissed her and told her he loved her. 

“Come back to me,” she managed to say. 

He gave her a shaky smile, tugged off his father’s ring and gave it to her. “To remember me by if I don’t come back.”

“You will.” She returned it to the finger on which it belonged. “You have to come back to me.”

He made an inarticulate sound and left to join his lords.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” she told Jon for the tenth time that morning. “Don’t engage with any of them, don’t-“

“Elia,” he sighed. “It’s a battle.”

She chuckled tearfully. “I know. Your-“ She caught herself. “Rhaegar died there. I don’t want you...either of you to suffer his fate.”

Jon wiped the tear from her cheek. “I’ll be careful. I promise. Aegon’s waiting for us. It’ll be as you told us all those years ago.” When he smiled she thought she could see Rhaegar there. “The next time we see each other it’ll be to place the gloating lion at your feet.”

“Do you know what I want more than that?”

“What?”

“You to come back alive.”

“Watch over him,” she told Ser Gerold. “Over all of them and make sure Trystane doesn’t go anywhere near the battlefield.” He insisted on squiring for Ser Gerold before the battle. “If anything goes wrong send him back here. Larence too and-“ She was sobbing again. Ser Gerold held her through it all. 

She stood on the walls of the small holdfast and watched them ride off, her husband, Jon, her nephew, Larence, Ser Gerold and thousands of men of the north - men who’d been her friends, whose wives and daughters she knew. Their banners snapped in the wind and the spring sun glinted against their sword hilts and harnesses. From a distance they looked like a conqueror’s parade, the impression strengthened by the sound of the drums, the tooting horns and the howling of the wolves. As they marched, Elia only saw three people: Ethan, Jon and Trystane. The first two were riding at the head of the line. Ser Gerold, Jon and his small army of wolves would be leading the outriders. Ethan sat tall astride his warhorse. 

_Turn around,_ she whispered. _Let me see your face one more time._

Just as he reached the top of a small hillock, as if he heard her, he looked back, raised a hand and waved. She lifted her arm in response. One last look and he was gone. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very few lines in A song of Ice & Fire make me laugh like this conversation: “Outlaws killed him,” sobbed Lady Amerei. “Father had only gone out to ransom Petyr Pimple. He brought them the gold they asked for, but they hung him anyway.” “Hanged, Ami,” [Lady Mariya interrupted her] “Your father was not a tapestry.” I giggle every time lol. Mariya really couldn’t care for Merrett. 
> 
> I find Merrett Frey’s story kind of sad. I know, I know he was a bully - I mean he tried to bully Jaime Lannister of all people as a kid (he wasn’t very successful obvs) - but as someone who struggles with headaches I feel his pain. Not only was he kidnapped by the Kingswood Brotherhood and mocked senseless for having his arse branded, he was knocked out with a mace, missed out on knighthood as a result, is seen as useless by everyone around him and suffers with chronic headaches he can only treat with alcohol. 
> 
> I know Merrett doesn’t have his own lands in canon - hence his constant effort to try and impress his family. I decided to give Mariya her own home because she deserves better than having to live under Walder Frey’s watch. I do wonder though how a cool character like Mariya gave birth to the bane of Bran’s life mr Little Walder Frey lmao. 
> 
> As for the actual crux of this chapter, it was time for Elia and Ethan to settle their differences. There’s nothing like death to force people to reconsider their priorities 🌚 
> 
> Ghost & Nymeria are reunited & Jon is finally smiling again. Papa wolf did say Ghost would find her.


	47. Jon

**Jon**

It was raining. Again. Jon scowled and pulled his drenched cloak closer. Fat lot of good that did. The water penetrated every gap in his clothing. 

_At least it’s warm,_ he reasoned. It would be another thing entirely to ride in the sleet of northern spring rains. 

Gerold rode ahead of the host with a hundred horses and sure shots to screen the host’s movements. No group they came across thus far escaped them. A few men had been sent back to Lord Glover for questioning. 

Their march south had been plagued by Tywin’s outriders who now and then would appear out of nowhere to unleash a storm of arrows before melting away into the surrounding wood. 

“They want to lure us south,” Ser Gerold told him. “ _That_ means Tywin is moving north to face us.”

“Good,” Jon replied. 

A group of six on light horses, ideal for scrambling away, rode ahead of them in the distance. Harrion Karstark, Daryn Hornwood and Edwin Snow, Lord Dustin’s son, rode in this group along with two Hornwood men-at-arms. The Lannister scouts rode on unsuspecting into the trees. They were some way into the wood when they saw the wolves waiting ahead. They tried to spin away but it was of little use. There were four groups of men waiting to ambush them. The wolves were in front of them. The horses whickered nervously where they were. Jon moved to bar their retreat. Cayn was on their left and Shadd on their right. Suddenly they realised they were surrounded. Sensing the horses’ fear of the wolves, they charged into Jon in an attempt to break free. The two aiming for him didn’t reach him, thanks to Ghost and Nymeria. A third was chased into a bramble thicket by Shadd. A scream came and then silence. Two raced ahead but Daryn and Harrion put that to an end. The last one, injured, yielded. It didn’t take him very long to die from Edwin’s arrow. 

They took a break beside the river to allow the horses a moment to drink. In the distance, Nymeria was loping playfully in the water with Ghost. He chased her and nipped at her ear when he caught her. She released a soft whine and Ghost bumped against her, touching his nose with hers. They’d both grown so much since they left Winterfell. What hadn’t changed was her deference to him. She still followed his lead and, taking her cue, so did her new pack of wolves. 

Seeing them together only made him miss Arya more. Every passing day filled him with greater regret about how lightly he treated their separation. He was so sure they would see each other again. He still held hope. Nymeria’s return had engendered that in him but it didn’t stop him worrying. What would they be like when they reunited? Would things be the same between them? What about when she was forced to marry the spotty-faced Frey boy squiring for Lord Bolton? Jon couldn’t imagine her willingly going to the boy’s bed. He was spoilt, ill-mannered and pompous too boot. Arya could probably beat him bloody as well. How was _he_ supposed to protect her? 

_Father wouldn’t force her,_ Jon told himself. But Robb’s words rang in his ears. _She will have to do her duty just as Father and our mother did._ Ned Stark’s own marriage had come about because of a similar agreement. Doubts creeped into his mind. _Perhaps he’ll tell her to do her duty. To disagree would be to sully the strength of Robb’s word._

“There!” Cayn pointed at two men galloping ahead. Jon climbed back upon his horse. He kicked a gentle heel into his mare’s ribs, urging her on with a soft click of his tongue. 

Ghost darted just ahead of him. Nymeria joined him. Seeing Jon, they swerved aside into a thicket. Too late. The first man fell off his horse. Another tried to spur away and was vaulted off his horse. Jon wheeled his own horse away before he reached the wood. Ghost and Nymeria skidded to a halt within a few feet of the thicket. 

“Wait here,” Ser Gerold said, narrowing his eyes to see into the growth. 

A cloaked, large man jumped down from a tree. 

“Gerold?” he shouted. “That you?” 

“No,” Ser Gerold laughed. 

The man answered with a bark of laughter and began to walk toward them. The sun had set three hours ago and though the full moon was bright, it was still hard to see very far. 

When Ghost snarled at him, he raised arms. “These must be the wolves we’ve heard so much about. Though we were told there was one for every Stark child. Are _those,”_ he leaned his head in the direction of the wood, “yours as well? If so, Old Ned really has been busy.” 

“They’re hers,” Jon said testily, pointing at Nymeria. 

“And who are you?” the man asked. “Actually,” he amended, “Take off your hood. I’ll guess.” 

Jon looked at Ser Gerold. 

He smiled encouragingly at him.

Jon did as he was asked.

“Hah!” the man barked. “Hah,” he laughed again. This time his laugh was punctuated by some emotion. “My, how you’ve grown.” He bent the knee and bowed. “Ser Oswell Whent, at your service.” 

Harrion, Daryn and their small group caught up with them. The heir of Karhold shot Jon a quizzical look.

“Are you not going to get off your horse and greet the second man to ever hold you?” he asked, now rising. 

Jon slid off his horse. 

“Arthur will tell you it was him who held you after Gerold. Don’t believe him.” A second man Jon thought belonged only in the stories, embraced him tightly. 

He took a step back and held Jon’s shoulders. He was at least a head taller than him and studied him carefully. “You look like her,” he said finally. “All of you does, except this.” He flicked Jon’s nose. “This is all your father. R-” 

Jon coughed loudly. “I haven’t told many people,” he mumbled in explanation, tilting his head back at the company.

Ser Oswell smiled wryly. “How long do you think you can keep it hidden, lad?”

“What are you doing here?” Ser Gerold asked after they exchanged greetings. 

“Screening your movements of course.” When Ser Gerold did not answer Ser Oswell spoke again. “Thank you, Os,” he said in a deep voice. “What would I ever do without you?” 

“Don’t mention it at all, Gerold.” He clapped him on his arm. “What are brothers for?” 

Ser Gerold folded his arms across his chest and raised a brow. 

The Black Bat ceased his jibes. Jon wished Bran was here. _He’d probably faint._

“Fine,” he conceded. “I am screening my own movements as well as yours. I have half Balaq’s archers coming through the wood as well as a contingent of heavy horse, mostly Dornish. We caught a few spies sent out to find you. Men sing like canaries under the right inducement.”

He turned to Jon. “You think I can borrow your wolves?” but before he could answer, Ser Oswell continued. “Tywin has gotten wind of your coming and is marching north. More fool him, we’d have a harder time against him where he was.”

“What was that all about then?” Daryn asked.

“The second man to hold you?”

”My mother had in my Dorne. They-”

”Come along.” Ser Gerold led him away.

Jon shrugged apologetically and followed with relief. He wasn’t ready yet to be anyone but Ned Stark’s son.

Lannister dead littered the forest floor and in the trees Jon began to see the archers lying in wait for the outriders. Some climbed down from the trees.

“A night march.” Ser Oswell grimaced as they told him about the northern host’s approach. “In my experience, the rested host always fares better.” 

“You sent word they were on the move. Lord Glover wanted to get here before they did. Besides,” Jon added, looking at Ghost as an idea formed in his head, “the Lannisters don’t _have_ to be rested....How far away is their camp?” 

“Not far. A mile or so perhaps.” 

When Jon shared his plan. The men of the Golden Company regarded him skeptically. 

“Are you sure this will work?” Ser Oswell asked. 

“Yes,” Ser Gerold answered before Jon. “I’ve seen them in action.” 

The rain eased a little by the time they neared the camp. Jon could hear music and laughter come from the camp. From where he stood, he could see the soft glow of lamps from inside the enemy’s tents. It lent the canvases a yellow glow. 

Jon stroked Nymeria’s coat. The dark shapes of sentries outlined the camp. 

“You better be right,” a dark man said to him. 

“He is, Balaq.” Ser Gerold put a hand on Jon’s shoulder. 

The man nodded, drew his bow and ordered his men to do the same. In a coordinated attack, they felled the sentries before they could make a sound. 

“Go,” Jon whispered to the wolves. Nymeria raised her snout and howled. Ghost raced ahead. As always, she followed. As did their pack. 

When Jon was a boy, Old Nan told him a story about a battle in the First Men’s war against the Andals. _‘When the night grew thick,”_ she said in a low voice, _“the Children of the Forest emerged from beneath a hollow hill to send hundreds of wolves against the Andal camp, tearing hundreds of men apart beneath the light of a crescent moon.”_

A few of Ser Oswell’s men sneaked past the dead sentries aiming to cut the horse lines once the wolves began to tear through the camp. Jon closed his eyes and became one with his companion. 

Ghost emerged through the trees into an opening in the camp, bared his teeth and growled. The smell of fear was unmistakable. Smelling _him,_ the nearest mount reared and screamed in terror. Men shouted in mantalk, the pack came hurtling silently from the darkness. Ghost fell upon a man with an unslung axe. Nymeria took down another before he could string his blow. Her smell was strong, powerful. The horses caught wind of it, hers and his and all of theirs and bolted. A man cut their ropes here. Another further down. The horses charged, trampling men and tents alike. The smell of blood filled the air and it’s sweet taste his belly. His sister ripped out a man’s throat. Ghost felled a man who tried to hurt her. Tents caught fire. Men screamed in terror. She howled. Ghost snarled in a voice only she could hear. She moved next to him. A hail of arrows fell but Ghost was faster, so was she. They raced ahead, their small cousins leaping behind them. 

“Ha!” Ser Oswell cackled. 

The men of the Golden Company were racing back to where they stood. The Lannister camp was in such disarray that they hadn’t the thought to look for where the attack came from. 

“Even their war-trained destriers went mad,” a man introduced to him as Ser Marq Mandrake guffawed. “They trampled their knights to death and I saw the rabble wake up not knowing what hit them. Many fled, casting their weapons aside to run faster. Not that your wolves allowed them to get very far.” 

Another man chuckled, announcing with amusement that between the wolves and the elephants the Lannisters stood no chance. 

“That kind of horror the night before a battle never bodes well.”

“Your mother would be so proud,” Ser Oswell told him as he pulled him into an embrace. “Now, go before they think to come looking. We’ll cover your back. Black Balaq and his men will join your archers. Tell Lord Glover where we’ll be come morning.” 

Jon nodded. For some reason Ser Oswell’s approval and Ser Gerold’s arm on his shoulder filled him with a warm feeling. Ghost and Nymeria returned just then, bounding back to him, tails wagging. Jon ruffled Ghost’s shaggy fur. “Well done, boy.” 

Nymeria nuzzled at his hand. 

“And you! All of you!” He laughed, speaking to the wolves in their pack. Nymeria yelped and they answered with calls of their own. 

Daryn and Harrion were still laughing when they finally caught sight of the northern host marching down the Kingsroad. Lord Glover led the host. His brother Galbart oversaw the baggage train. The small contingent of heavy horse composed of Manderly, Karstark and Bolton men rode behind Lord Bolton. Lord Dustin’s maester carried with him four cages full of ravens while Lord Ryswell’s marched with Robb’s. 

“Well, you’ve been busy,” Martyn said. “I wish I could have seen it.” 

“Me too.” Lord Glover clapped him on the back. “Tell me about the Lannister camp.” 

“Their banners were numberless,” Jon said honestly. “Their camp is like a small town with endless pavilions and even more horses. I’m sure many died tonight but we should still expect a host of at least 15,000 men tomorrow. Probably more.” 

“They had 20,000 men,” Ser Franklyn said. Jon realised he forgot to introduce the men Ser Oswell sent. He introduced the commander of the five hundred Golden Company archers and the captain of the small contingent of knights Ser Oswell sent. 

“Ser Oswell has a cavalry of a thousand men in the eastern wood,” Jon added. “He said he would be grateful for any men you can send his way.” 

The Golden Company officers updated them with the whereabouts of what they called the Royal Army and of Aegon’s conquest more generally. 

“Any news of Lord Eddard?” Martyn asked. 

Ser Franklyn shook his head. “Not yet.” 

Once they settled on their battle plans, and given the chaos in the Lannister camp, Lord Glover gave the men an hour to see to their needs before they’d get into battle formation. 

Jon’s blood was still hot with the excitement of his first battle...or rather Ghost’s. He could not find it in him to sleep. Most men did though.

Trystane helped Ser Gerold into his white and golden armour. The White Bull was on one knee, sharpening his blade with a whetstone when Jon moved to sit beside him. Ser Gerold’s bull helmet lay beside him. 

Jon swept his gaze past the fast waters of the River Trident to the forested hills on the opposite bank. 

He found himself drifting back into the past, as if he were Ned Stark or Rhaegar Targaryen meeting on the banks of this river. He tried to imagine what Rhaegar must have been feeling as he came to fight against the brother of the woman who carried his child. _Why couldn’t he tell the truth? Ned Stark would have listened,_ Jon reasoned. “There was no time to talk,” Ser Gerold told him the last time he said that. 

To Jon’s surprise, the knight in question shared with him what he named one of his greatest regrets. 

“There are so many I don’t know where to begin,” he said. “I turned a blind eye, hiding behind my vows, as my king committed unspeakable crimes. I let Rhaegar leave without me for The Trident-“

“You did your duty by him.”

Ser Gerold smiled thinly. “Would that I had. We left _you_ behind. Rhaegar charged us with your safety and we left you alone.”

“I wasn’t alone.” 

“You deserved to know who you truly were. You should have been raised with your brother and uncle. We owed you the same duty we owed Aegon and Viserys. Can you ever forgive us for that failure?”

“There’s nothing to forgive, Ser Gerold.” Of all the people Jon imagined seeking his forgiveness, Ser Gerold Hightower, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard and veteran of countless battles never featured once. 

“There is everything to forgive.” Ser Gerold ran the whetstone down the sword. “My vows preclude me from ever fathering a son of my own. Rhaegar was the closest thing I had to one.” He smiled wistfully, gazing out into the night. “I was there the night he was born just as I was when Aegon was born, when you were born. Your father was not the man they’d have you believe and being Rhaegar’s son is not a thing to dread. Rhaegar was an honourable man, noble, kind, just. He was everything a man could want in a son...in a king and he died before his time. I’ve given my old age to put my prince’s son upon the throne. I’ve raised Aegon on the values of his forefathers. I’ve taught him what I knew of King Aegon, and of my King Jaehaerys, who raised me to Lord Commander. I have tried to teach him as much as I can of where Aerys went wrong and of the man Rhaegar was. I wish I was there to see you grow as I did Aegon and I wish you could know your father’s family as you know your mother’s.”

“Well,” Jon tried, “we’re still alive for a few more hours at least.”

Ser Gerold humoured him with tales of old kings. 

“I’ve seen you with Lord Stark’s children,” he said after a while. “You love them and they you. But you must remember, you _have_ a brother. One who will need you now more than ever. Stand beside him. I am sure he will do the same for you.”

“I will try my best.” _For Elia’s sake._

Finally, just before dawn, the rain stopped. “At last.” The white-haired captain of the Golden Company’s archers grinned. All night he’d been complaining of how the rain would render the bowstrings fragile and their arrows ineffectual. Had it continued to rain once the sun was up he said he would have had to order his men to shorten the strings and shoot. At some point the bows would break and they would have to resort to fighting alongside the men-at-arms. 

“Arrows are deadlier than the sword,” he said, fitting the bottom string loop over the bottom tip of his bow. 

“And safer for the man who wields them,” laughed Ser Franklyn Flowers. 

The man scoffed. “I’ll tell you now, it’ll be my men…and these ones,,” he added gesturing with his head at the northern archers, “who’ll win the battle today.” In the burgeoning light, now that he had cast his feathered cloak aside, Jon could see the man clearly. His skin was as dark as the midnight sky and his hair as white as snow. Each of his massive arms was covered in golden rings, each for a year in service of the Golden Company. _The Royal Army,_ Jon reminded himself. _They call themselves The Royal Army._

The archers were stringing their bows. The Westerosi among the host, both northmen and men of the Royal Army, favoured longbows carved from yew. They were huge things reserved for war and for hunting, capable of felling stags at a hundred paces, and favoured by men of strength capable of hauling their weight with ease. The Wull would be leading the northern archers. The rest of the archers among their new companions favoured either cross-bows or double-curved horn-and-sinew bows that Jon had never seen before. Black Balaq and his small group of men from the Summer Islands were stringing bows made of goldenheart. 

Sarella had gifted Arya a small bow made of the wood when she last visited Winterfell.

“Practice and get better,” she told her. 

Arya tried but had never quite mastered the bow before she left. It was still somewhere in her chambers along with all the weapons she left behind. _They might have helped her_ , he thought. _She could have hidden Prince Oberyn’s dagger in her clothes and used it to protect her wherever she is._ He laughed to himself as he remembered the horror on Lady Stark’s face when she saw the deadly cache of gifts from the Martells Arya had in her rooms - none of them suitable for a lady. Father had let her keep them all but said she was not allowed to wield any without supervision. Jon wondered if she still had Needle. Father had let her keep that too. Could it keep her safe? Wherever she was, he knew she was alive. _She has to be._ He would know if she wasn’t. _Nymeria would know._ What he didn’t know, to his frustration, was if she was safe. 

In the distance trumpets blared with urgency. It made a change from the screams of terror the night before. They were answered by the beating of northern drums. To Jon they sounded more ferocious, surer of themselves. They had every reason to be. Tywin Lannister had no idea just quite what he was walking into. 

The Wull, _Buckets_ , as Lord Glover and Martyn fondly called him, was overseeing the hammering of stakes into the ground across the hills. The archers were to retreat behind them in case of a cavalry charge. Their careful planting provided space enough for a man to retreat behind them but none for a horse to pass through without injury. For any man lucky enough to make it past the archers, the sharp ends of the stakes would be yet another obstacle to pass through before they reached the shield wall. They’d then need to fight past men-at-arms five rows deep.

The stakes only strengthened the perfect defensive position. The northern host was forming battle lines on the crests of the hills near the crossing. The southern slopes of the hills opened to a wide field divided on one side by the Kingsroad- the only path by which the Lannisters could attack - and the Green Fork of The Trident. The spring rains turned the land bordering the river marshy. The field itself was not in a much better state. _It will only get worse as men and horses make it muddier._

“I would not want to fight in _that_ ,” Daryn commented as if he could read Jon’s mind. “They’ll be sitting ducks.”

“I believe that’s the point.” When Jon thought about the inevitability of fighting the Lannisters, his heart raced. They had tried to kill Bran, they had attacked Fa-, Lord Eddard. Not far from here Joffrey attacked Arya. Heward and Wyl had died on the ends of their swords, Jory lost his arm, they held Sansa. It was a shame the Kingslayer wasn’t here but Tywin was good enough. Jon made a promise to Elia that he would be thrown at her feet. 

“Just a shame they’re not Fossoways,” added Ser Franklyn.

“What do you have against them?” 

“My mother was a washerwoman at Cider Hall,” the hulk of a man told him. “‘till one of milord's sons raped her. Makes me a sort o' brown apple Fossoway.” For a man who looked as he did, Ser Franklyn talked a lot and laughed even more. His face was crisscrossed with old scars, all of them gained in battle. His left ear was missing entirely and his right ear looked as if it had been chewed. Like Black Balaq, he too wore numerous golden arm rings. Yet for all his levity when he spoke, Ser Gerold assured him he was one of the finest fighters in the Golden Company. 

The White Bull himself was deep in conversation with Lord Glover. 

The archers moved to their positions, pushing arrows down into the soil ready for plucking.Some sat on the floor, some even slept in the waiting, unperturbed by the loud beating of drums or the hammering of stakes around them. To retain mobility, some of the men had begun taking off their boots. The mud had the propensity to suck a man down as he squelched through it. 

Half a mile away Jon began to see the first arrivals of the Lannister host. They were a mass of colour on horseback beneath bright, if damp, banners. Some were charred around the edges. A purple unicorn, a boar, a rooster, and of course the golden lion. Whatever damage the wolves had done the night before, and it was significant, they still had more horses than Jon imagined.

The right flank was the first to line up. They had at least three thousand horses, all cavalry. The horses were weighed down by the armoured men atop them. They formed row after well-ordered row of knights atop high-stepping destriers. Though the plates glinted, each knight more impressive than the one before, Jon couldn’t help but notice the odd man among them with mismatched armour unsuited to his station. It made him smile.Their standard bearer shook out the banner beside the leader. With its unfurling Jon saw a burning tree, orange and smoke. _Addam Marbrand._ The man who’d plagued their journey south. While he might have escaped them, Jon reveled in the satisfaction that most of his scouts hadn’t. He couldn’t help but turn his gaze to the woods in the east. _Soon,_ he thought, having seen what wolves did to horses the night before. _Soon._

The northern drummers began beating a quick rhythm answered by the flaring sound of trumpets from the other side. One ferocious, the other harried. 

The Lannister center came next. The damp standards raised above the Kingsroad all bore the lion of Lannister. Immediately, Jon knew where he would aim. The armoured horse only painted a target on the man leading the group.  
The Lannister archers lined up with this group. They arrayed themselves into three long lines to the east and west of the Kingsroad, stringing their bows as the northerners had before them. The pikemen formed squares between them and the men-at-arms with spears and axes were behind them. There were knights and lords among these men too. The banners spotted a yellow sun, a badger, and a peacock that reminded Jon of Black Balaq’s feathered cloak. 

Lining up beside the river was the left flank. They were led by a giant of a man surrounded by men of some fighting capability. The rest of the vanguard though consisted of the sorriest troops imaginable to man. They were mounted archers in ripped and sodden leather jerkins, men on horses more suited for plowing than war and curiously, men who looked more like wildlings than men of the west. Their horses, for the few among them _on_ horses, could barely carry them. In amongst the rabble Jon spotted The Imp. 

Just then the trumpeting grew louder and the Lannister rear came to view atop the opposing hill. In amongst the massive force of at least five thousand men, half mounted and half foot, it was impossible to miss the single man under the banner of the lion. He wore a lion helm, one paw raking the air as it roared. His armour glinted gold even from where Jon stood. It was enamelled in red steel the colour of blood. This man made the Lannister Jon singled out earlier look a lowly knight. 

“Tywin Lannister.” Old Martyn voiced what Jon already knew. 

While the Old Lion watched his men from afar, Ethan Glover strode to the centre of his men. “Today,” he began, “We fight for Lord Eddard and for Winterfell. Our cause is just, our swords are sharp and today, we will remind them just how many southron swords one of ours is worth.” 

The men broke into hoots of laughter and cheers. 

“I will not lie to you,” he added more seriously, “and tell you victory will come easy, but it _will_ come. Not because of our friends but because each of you is worth ten of them. I will not ask of you to do today what I will not do myself. I will stand with you. I will face the danger beside you and I will not be defeated. Nor will you. We are sons of the north and _that_ ,” he smiled, raising his steel gauntlet, “makes all the difference. You will fight now as you did once before in this very land. You will fight so that every man in Westeros can hold his head high and walk proudly never fearing the yoke of tyranny again!” 

“For Eddard!” Old Martyn boomed.

“For Eddard!” Lord Glover repeated.

“Eddard!” The cheer spread through the host.

“For Winterfell!” 

“For Brandon Stark!” others answered.

The Golden Company archers joined in with yells of “For Elia!” 

For a moment there was a lull in the cries until Theo Wull echoed the cry and men began to adopt the call. “For Elia!” rang out from the hills. 

_For Rhaenys,_ Jon thought. _For the sister I never knew and for Arya wherever she is._

Harooooooooooooo a warhorn blew. Lannister trumpets answered, da-DA da-DA da-DAAAAAAAAA but no man moved. 

The Lannisters seemed content to wait for the northern charge, no doubt aware that they would be fighting in a sea of mud. Lord Glover only stared out. The archers looked bored. Even the massive man leading the vanguard did not spur on his equally massive horse. The riders held their long lances upright, visors open. 

Finally after what felt like hours trumpets blared on the Lannister side. Black Balaq licked a finger, raised it in the air and smiled. 

The Lannister archers were the first to fire and the reason for the Summer Islander’s grin became quite clear. Their arrows fell short thanks to an opposing wind. 

“Wait!” Black Balaq said. Buckets echoed the call along the line. Even so the archers began to pick up their bows. The Lannisters tried again and once more the arrows fell short. Again and again they tried to clear out the northern archers and every time they failed. Laughter spread through the northern lines. Shooting uphill was a hard task for any man, doing so against the wind was all the harder. 

The trumpets sounded again. In the lulls between breaths, Jon could hear the clinks of visors being dropped. What were faces moments before turned to faceless steel all along the left flank. 

“Draw!” Black Balaq ordered in a loud voice. 

The vanguard, a thousand men strong, began to charge. 

Surrounding sounds seemed to dim until Jon could hear only the quick thumping of his heart and the stretching of bowstrings as arrows were placed in bows.

He could see the foam on the warhorses' mouths as they raced across the field. 

“Loose!” Black Balaq shouted.

“Strike!” 

The newly sunlit sky darkened under a cloud of arrows and the battlefield filled with the soft sigh of their flight. The mud slowed the horses but they were plowing through. The arrows seemed to hover for what seemed like a lifetime and then they fell, creating blind panic. In amongst the noise was the sound of arrowheads plunging into steel armour but those sounds were rarer than pain-filled braying of horses. It became clear then that the bowmen were aiming not for the knights but the mounts beneath them. 

“Again!” 

The archers released another volley. Horses aware now of what was befalling them began to shy away from the rain of death. Some stopped short where they stood, others bucked free of their riders. Men fell, managing to sit up before the next row crashed into them. Jon watched the charge crumple into anarchy. Those who continued racing across the field were blinded by the arrows and slowed by the mud. 

“Now!” Buckets yelled and arrows flew once more. More screams. The sounds of man and horse became one. Blood as red as the leaves of the weirwood tree spewed from countless wounds, puddling over the mud. 

“Loose!” 

The front rows of the bowmen continued to aim for the charging horses. Those further down switched their aim higher, raining arrows on those still in the Lannister lines. The same wind that had stopped the Lannister arrows short added power to these shots, carrying the arrows further. 

The wildling-looking men among the charging army fell like flies from their scrawny horses.  
A group of the front row archers were aiming for the eye slits in helmets. Many struck true, most hit the horses. More men were thrown from their mounts and fell into the mud only to be trampled. The sounds of death stained the air. Unable to turn back, those at the front charged as quickly as their horses could carry them over the mud. It was little use. The strength of bows made to fell stags were sufficient to knock a man backwards creating a ripple of chaos behind him. The subsequent rows of the left flank still charged. If those before them did not push through the northern ranks they would be trapped as rabbits in a snare. At the last moment some baulked seeing the coming arrows, the dead horses, and the struggling men wallowing in the mud. With nowhere to go and those behind them rushing forward they became the sticking ducks Daryn predicted. Horses screamed, men tried to control them. They failed. 

Even so, some horses made it up the slope. 

“Back!” Black Balaq shouted. The archers stepped backwards. “Back!” They made it behind the stakes and retreated behind the shield wall clicking into place. Still they shot and still they struck true. 

Then the charge struck home. Some of the horses shied just before they reached the stakes. The massive man’s horse was gored through the belly, stake deep in its chest, blood mingling with the foam around its mouth. The smell of blood filled the air. His mouth watered. _Wait,_ Jon thought. _Please wait. Feed later._

Men twisted and screamed, lances fell. The massive man charged through the stakes and into the shield wall, hacking about with his two-handed greatsword. He created a gap in the shield wall and was answered by Ser Franklyn. They hacked and cut and lunged at each other. Ser Franklyn, Jon realised, was laughing behind his visor. Then he struck the big knight in the gap in his helmet. The man fell, the gap in the wall was filled and the shield wall held the line. 

Jon had never seen so much death. Corpses littered the field. Some were riding back down the slope, more ran. Horses, maddened with agony, charged back at their own lines trampling the slower men in their wake. The retreating vanguard turned the already muddy ground even muddier. Men were calf-deep into it, trying to drag armoured feet free and failing before horse and man crashed into them. Many drowned face down in the mud. Some were already deserting, shedding their armour and attempting to swim across the river. 

Men chattered excitedly seeing the retreat begging to be allowed to plunge into the gap.

“Stay,” Jon heard Ser Gerold tell Lord Glover. “You saw those men. Farm hands most of them were, sellswords and whatever poor souls Tywin Lannister could find. He _meant_ for them to fail. Plunge into this gap now and his pikemen will pin you while his rear drives you into the river. Wait. Let him show his hand.” 

Lord Glover let out a huff. 

“What is it with this man and drowning armies?” 

Lord Glover shouted a stay order. The beating of the drums changed to reflect this. 

As the Lannisters retreated, the archers stepped back into position. The wind picked up, once more blowing against the Lannisters. To Jon’s surprise, Black Balaq ordered his men to pluck up arrows further afield and add them to their quivers. 

Seeing the horses flounder, the center came marching on foot. The trumpets grew louder, the drums beat, warhorns bleated. 

_Soon,_ Jon whispered. _Soon._ His gaze never left the oncoming host. Row upon row they came rippling. 

“For Elia!”The Golden Company archers yelled, letting their arrows loose. 

“For Eddard,” answered the northmen releasing another volley against the same enemy. 

The advancing host did better than their earlier counterparts, the arrows less effective against them. 

They got closer, the archers moved back. The Lannister archers now began to shoot. Shields were raised. 

“Hold the line!” The call was repeated. The drums passed on the message. Jon grabbed his lance, wishing for a moment that Robb was here. _He was always the better lance._ Jon was made for a sword in his hand but the time for that had not yet come. Mikken had made him a sword before he rode off. _For Lord Eddard,_ he said. _Strike true for me._

“Eddard!” Old Martyn cried out. “For Eddard and Winterfell!” He turned to Jon. “Well, it would appear you’re finally going into battle, lad,” he smiled. “I have no doubt you will acquit yourself today and show them all I taught you. Don’t embarrass me out there.” 

Jon managed a grin. “I might even win me some lions.” 

Swinging on to his horse, Lord Glover laughed. “Enjoy it,” he told Jon. “War is like a woman and your first is unforgettable.” 

Ser Gerold was riding behind the front lines. “They’re going to rush into you,” he was telling them. “Upon my word, you’ll step back three paces. Make them lunge into the air and strike them on the counter.” 

“Don’t die,” Daryn told him. 

“You too.” 

The Lannisters began shouting their war cries. “Casterly Rock!” they bellowed. 

Carried by the call of war, “Winterfell!” Jon shouted back. “Hornwood!” Daryn followed him. “Karhold!” 

“Deepwood Motte!” 

“Dreadfort!” 

“New Castle!” 

On and on each man called out the name of home. 

Then came the rush. 

“Now!” Ser Gerold shouted. “Now!” 

Jon stepped back the three paces, mud pulling at his feet each time. Jon heard the excitement in the Lannister forces thinking they struck terror into their hearts.

“Now!” Ser Gerold bellowed. “Strike!” Jon rammed his lance forward spearing the point into his opponent. 

They struck, the northmen stepped back. Again Jon struck muscle and blood flowed. 

“Make them climb over their dead friends!” 

“Jon,” he heard someone shout. “Watch out!” Jon threw himself aside. An arrow sank close to him. More fell. His lance broke. He lunged with the splintered stub before throwing it away and pulling out his sword. _This_ he knew very well. He rammed its point into visors and groins and anywhere he could strike true.

“Keep close!” Lord Glover shouted. “Hold the line!” 

In amongst the rabble Jon saw The Imp atop a horse on the slope of the hill just past the stakes. He knew he should stay put. He knew a run across the mud was not the best idea that had ever come to him but inside him the fire grew into a red hot rage at the man whose dagger nearly killed Bran. A riderless horse bolted past him. Jon grabbed its mane with his off hand and vaulted himself on to her back.

“Jon!” Old Martyn yelled but Jon could not look back; he had eyes only for the Lannister dwarf.

“Jon!” Harrion Karstark was riding behind him. 

“Are you with me?” Jon shouted back. 

“Yes!” 

Gripping his sword, Jon stood in his stirrups and swung at the endless row of men standing between him and the Lannister dwarf. Without their horses they were easy pickings for him atop his. He leaped over the stakes. _Your mother was half a horse,_ Old Martyn said. 

The Lannister Imp saw him at the last moment. Their destriers slammed together and The Imp’s axe fell out from his hand. Jon swung and The Imp followed his axe off the horse. 

“Jon!” Harrion called out before striking a morningstar into the face of a man coming to The Imp’s rescue.

“Yield!” The Imp cried out. He made his way to his knees and then pushed forward aiming to gore the horse with the spike on his helmet. Jon swung out of the way and leaped off his horse onto the Lannister. Dragging him, weaponless, past the stakes was no hard work. Harrion followed him through a gap. 

Jon punched The Imp in the mouth when they were back behind their lines. 

Tyrion Lannister wiped his mouth. “Is this what they teach you in Winterfell about how to treat a yielding opponent?” He spat out blood. 

“You tried to have Bran killed.” 

“Oh,” he began to laugh bitterly. “This again. I am sure you’ve heard by now I was found not guilty by the gods in a trial by combat.” 

“You just had the stronger man on your side.” 

“A man who now lies dead thanks to your friend.” He studied Harrion’s surcoat for a moment. “Karstark is it?” 

With their arrows exhausted, the Golden Company archers began to emerge carrying swords, axes, maces, lances and every weapon in-between. Jon had no doubt they were just as effective with them. He found Lord Glover and threw The Lannister Imp at his feet. 

“Take him away,” Lord Glover told Harrion. “Your first Lannister of the day,” he said to Jon.

“Hopefully not the last.” 

Lord Glover patted him on the back and said, “Next time, don’t charge without knowing someone is at your back.” 

The sun edged higher into the sky. Wounded men sprawled atop corpses - most of them from the Lannister side though there were the odd northmen among them. The Lannisters began to give ground and retreated, inch by inch. 

A sudden shout of triumph exploded from the northern ranks when a Lannister standard was seized.

The dying screamed for help and water. Among the northern dead being carried off the field Jon saw Old Martyn. 

He stumbled. Then he ran. “No!” he wailed. His ears rang. Tears welled in his eyes. He felt numb. The men carrying him off the field, lowered the stretcher. He knelt beside him, tears blurring his vision. “You can’t go,” he cried. “You can’t go. We’re going to win.” 

Old Martyn didn’t answer him. Jon’s hands were warmed by his blood. 

He tucked an errant cloak on the ground around him, just as Old Martyn had done for him countless times in his childhood. Martyn Cassel was a mainstay in his life and just like that he was gone. 

The men raised him up and were carrying him away when Ser Gerold appeared. “An axe,” he offered. “He killed the man who swung it and two more behind him before he died.”

“He was calling me,” Jon whispered. He looked at Ser Gerold. “He was calling me and I didn’t answer.” He crouched, his legs almost unable to carry him. Then he fell backwards, sitting in the mud, knees raised. “He was calling me.” He cradled his head in his hands. “He was calling me. I should have been by his side.” 

“He died fighting for what he thought right. There is no greater honour for a man like him.” 

Jon knew there was truth in it yet the words brought him no comfort at all. 

Lord Glover rode up and down the northern lines trying to instill strength and purpose into his men. 

“Soon,” Jon heard him tell them. “Their time is coming.” 

From atop the ridge Tywin Lannister made his move. The rear marched forward and the cavalry on the right began to bring down their visors. Jon could feel the terror pass through the northern lines. The strength of the remaining Lannister force was going to bear down on them. 

Jon rose and squared his shoulders. He only felt rage. 

Lord Glover continued his speech. “We have the greater number,” he was saying. “They cannot overcome us. They _will_ not overcome us! Are you southron cowards or men of the north? See how they fear us! They” he pointed with his sword. “They are the ones who run from the field and they only dare face us hiding behind their numbers and their horses. They will charge and they will die. Hold the line.”

Wave after endless wave of Lannisters crested the hill. He inhaled, looked at Ser Gerold, exhaled and marched back to his place. 

The Lannisters right, all cavalry, began to charge. 

“Now!” Jon whispered. “Now, Ghost, now.” Nymeria howled and the pack emerged from the trees, teeth bared, growls loud. 

Mounts reared and screamed in terror. 

Behind the wolves Ser Oswell and Lord Bolton led the cavalry out of the eastern wood and into the Lannister right flank. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would apologise for the long note but who apologises when they’re having a rant? I’ll clear any spelling mistakes in the morning, I’m absolutely knackered.
> 
> I always laugh whenever GRRM spells out the sound of things. I couldn’t help but include that. 
> 
> The Mountain died in the first chapter of this fic. Assume a similarly monstrous man led the Lannister vanguard. My headcanon is one of the Crakehalls. They’re unusually large. It also creates conflict for Merrett Frey. I could have written this chapter from Merrett’s POV but I get the feeling no one cares what he thinks 😂
> 
> The only reason the northerners lost as badly as they did at the Battle of the Green Fork is because Roose Bolton made sure they did. 
> 
> He made the army march all night. That in itself wouldn’t be a problem if Roose struck Tywin while he was sleeping. Instead, he parked the host a mile away to get into battle formation. For what? This allowed Tywin to get ready. Here, Jon levels the (tired-olympics) playing field by making sure the Lannisters don’t sleep either & are super anxious. Robb used Greywind to scare the horses at Oxcross and this caused havoc. He only had one wolf. Jon has a little army thanks to Nymeria. We also know the Lannister camp was in a wooded area. They’re tightly packed and don’t have much room for manoeuvre which allows the wolves to move through in a blur terrifying the horses and letting them do the work of stampeding through the camp. Tyrion was also really fearful about Robb bringing the wolves to the battle (he’s been attacked by Ghost, Shaggy, Summer & Grey Wind. It was about time Nymeria got a go lol).
> 
> The northern forces were mainly infantry and were on a hill. Any man with sense would take the higher ground, force the Lannisters to attack & shower them with arrows. Instead Roose put the following houses at the front and ordered them to charge: 
> 
> • The Hornwoods - Lord Hornwood’s land borders his. He wants hunting privileges north of a ridge, a holdfast taken from his grandfather and to build a dam on the White Knife. Ramsay takes Castle Hornwood after this battle.  
> •The Manderlys - they grow in power if Lord Hornwood gets his way. They’re also related to Lady Hornwood.  
> •The Karstarks - as relatives of the Starks they will always come before him in getting power over the north. 
> 
> Tyrion notes all the sigils in the battle and not once does he see the flayed man of Bolton. This is something Roose will repeat again and again during the War of the 5 kings. He returns home after the Red Wedding with more or less as many men as he came south with. Ethan’s actions here butterfly away the capture of Lord Cerwyn, Ser Wylis Manderly, Harrion Karstark, the 4 Freys and the death of Lord Hornwood.
> 
> On a related note, Daryn Hornwood marched with the infantry not Robb so he doesn’t die at the Whispering Wood. Alys Karstark will get her happy ending without (some of) the preceding heartache damn it! 
> 
> As for the question of how the Lannisters are not aware of Ser Oswell’s cavalry & Golden Company archers, I’m going to assume the only professional standing army in Westeros is able to screen its movements. While Addam Marbrand is a step up from Janos Slynt (who isn’t?) he didn’t know the northerners split or even where they were until they popped up a mile away from the Lannister camp in canon. The Riverlands are Ser Oswell’s home turf, I’m sure he knows about paths the Lannisters’ Westerland army doesn’t.
> 
> Tyrion starts the battle complaining about his mismatched armour but boy did he have the strongest plot armour known to man lol. He escaped capture because he just happened to gore a horse with a spike on his helmet (looks at camera like really?) and then he didn’t die when the horse fell on him. Puh-lease!!
> 
> Early Jon is looking for glory & adventure. There’s also the added element of him being stuck between two brothers who get to lead armies. He is looking for his own claim to glory and his own chance to leave a mark on the battle. So instead of playing his hero the Young Dragon, he plays the supporting (but vital) role of an Aemon the Dragonknight or Brandon Snow figure. As a side note, as unrealistic as Jon vaulting on a moving horse sounds, I stole that off canon. Everyone knows angry Jon is superhuman lol.
> 
> I can imagine the Freys and the Westerosi among the Golden Company archers being like, “Excuse me, are we invisible?!l” while Ethan spoke 😂
> 
> I made myself cry when I killed Old Martyn :( My heart hurts. I hadn’t even planned it, it just came while I was writing. 
> 
> Next, in the second of our three battle chapters, we see the battle play out from Tywin’s perspective. Cersei is not too mistaken when she calls herself Tywin-with-teats. Her dad is full of crap too.


	48. Tywin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter starts dark and it’s beginning made me feel sick to write and research. So heads up on that. 

**Tywin**

He woke again to the cawing of crows. They crowded over the swinging corpse in the yard. Her eyes were the first to go, then her lips. Today they feasted on her cheeks leaving a horrid red smile. He heard it terrified the pages. Tywin scoffed into his cup. This was war. They’d see many worse things before it was over. 

He returned his gaze to the gibbet. She hung unseeing and yet the holes that once held her eyes seemed to bear into him accusingly. He took another sip of the wine. The audacious look on the corpse was so at odds with the snivelling woman who’d begged for her life. 

“I told her not to m’lord,” she pleaded. “I said I want no trouble. They didn’t listen to me m’lord. I had nothing to do with it.”

Tywin regarded her long and hard, sharpening his long sword. 

“I’ll give you and your men free room and board, m’lord. I want no trouble.” On and on the innkeep babbled. 

“Have the village rounded up,” Tywin told Kevan.

“M’lord, please-“

Tywin cut her off with a raised hand, barely sparing her a glance. He ordered Burton Crakehall to oversee the raising of a gibbet. The woman’s knees gave way then. 

“If you bring a serpent into your house…” he riddled her, “and it bites your guest...is the harm the serpent’s fault or yours?”

She screamed when one of The Mountain’s men kicked her for an answer. Gregor Clegane was long dead but his butchers were still useful under Crakehall. For all the scruples Roland Crakehall had, his brother had none. 

“M’lord. M’lord forgive-“

“I do not.”

They dragged her out in front of the waiting villagers huddled together in tight circles. One hundred families at most. _Probably less._ He didn’t count. The gibbet was erected in the middle of the yard. 

“M’lord,” were her last words before the drop. Not that it killed her. Burton calculated it so that her neck did not break immediately and her windpipe was not crushed so quickly. The fat woman kicked and spasmed and even wet herself before the corners of her eyes began to turn red. Her face flushed with blood. Then her eyes popped out. Still she kicked.   
  
More than one villager vomited but Tywin watched on. A lesson needed to be sent. Her tongue lolled out but she still didn’t die. That took time. The villagers moaned with the terror of it, clutching each other for strength. 

When it was done, “Burn it down,” the Warden of the West ordered. It was early spring and plowing had already begun. This village, he learnt, only had the two oxen to share between their farms. 

“Spare the animals,” he amended. _There is always a need for food._ “And the smithy.” _An army will always find use for weapons._

He stood there watching as market stalls were turned over and white cottages burnt to blackened foundations leaving behind only tumbled stones. Even the rain did little to quell the fire. Tywin had them pour oil over the wet roofs. The stone sept was the only thing to survive. Though it’s thatched roof was gone. Pigs screamed and huffed until they too were saved from their sties. The men feasted on roasted pork that evening. 

Some sorry souls tried to fight and were put to the sword. Most just watched in silence as their livelihoods turned to ash before them. 

“Go with your lives,” Tywin told them. “And tell your lords that Lannisters _always_ pay their debts.” He could’ve killed them of course but experience taught Tywin Lannister nothing cowed men like fear and the further fear of him spread the better. It was why Lady Whent surrendered Harrenhal and why they came upon empty garrisons on their way north. 

The arrival of a rider in the yard sent the crows flying and squawking. It made it easier to see her now. The loss of her lips and cheeks and the stained tinge to her teeth gave her a sinister smile. One that in turns taunted him and reminded him of the laughing lion that still haunted him in his sleep. 

Everything Tywin did was to raise the name of Lannister after his father reduced it to ridicule with his frivolity and his laughter. Sometimes that laughter still rang in Tywin’s ears. As did that of Roger Reyne. _He wasn’t laughing when he drowned to death. Nor did his sister when I brought down her hall over her head._ Ellyn Tarbeck laughed Kevan out of it with a taunting of _"You are not the only lions in the west, ser. My brothers are coming, and their claws are just as long and sharp as yours.”_ Tywin folded his fingers into a fist. The mockery still rankled but he made a lasting example of them all. For years that one move of decisiveness did more for him than anything his father had ever achieved. 

_The Rains of Castamere_ were sung far and wide until no man dared to raise a hand against him or his. _Until the Greyjoys._ They were soon cowed as well. Tywin told Robert the Brute to make another island of their skulls. Burning their towns and breaking their castles was not lesson enough for what they had done. Robert might have considered those words were it not for Eddard Stark’s suggestion to hold Balon Greyjoy’s heir as a hostage instead. 

That was not the first time the man came between Tywin and his goals either. No man raised a voice at him and lived long enough to tell the tale. _Not since Aerys. No man but Ned Stark._ Tywin tightened his fist. He remembered the young lord’s hateful glare as he accused him of murder and dishonour and even had the gall to raise his sword in accusation before calling for Jaime to be sent to the Night’s Watch. Tywin would have put them all to the sword had they dared that. 

He knew then there was every chance for it to come to swords between them. Ned Stark’s van was rushing south of The Trident and Tywin _had_ to be the first in the city. He had to be the one to hand it over to the victor. After sitting back from the war, he had to give Robert a gift large enough to win him standing. Tywin was so caught up in trying to save his heir from Aerys’ hold and paying him in kind that he failed to keep an eye on Ned Stark. Not that Tywin ordered the rape of Elia Martell, only her murder...and even that was implicit. He hadn’t mentioned her at all. He couldn’t care less whether she lived or died. Her children were what mattered. Ned Stark got to her before she expired. 

Tywin sighed. The black eyed woman had been plotting if Cersei was to be believed. She smuggled out a son that turned his eyes on the Mad King’s throne. That belonged to Tywin’s line now and he had no plans to return it to the dragons. Not after all Aerys’ slights against his honour. _Against my Joanna._

Once the Starks were crushed, he would turn his attentions to the nuisance in the south. The boy had apparently bolted himself in Dragonstone with the fifteen thousand or so men he took Dragonstone with. 

Ned Stark was the bigger concern. Jon Arryn had been a known quantity, a stable Hand and judicious. Ned Stark, on the other hand, was a firebrand in his misguided pursuit of honour and justice. Tywin knew trouble was on the horizon when he was named Hand and it only took the missive from Baelish about a missing dagger to see it come to fruition. His host was ready and waiting even before Jaime rode in with the by then old news of Tyrion’s abduction. In no time at all, Tywin rode forth with his two hosts and their endless supply trains. The abduction was the excuse he needed to crush the man who’d dared more than once to challenge him. 

He’d banked on Ned Stark's quest for justice when he ordered Crakehall to travel ahead and harry the Riverlands. _A shame Jaime crippled his leg. Had he not done so he’d have marched on me and died._

“Tywin,” the door creaked to let his brother in. 

“Who was the rider?” 

“A messenger from Cersei.” 

Tywin scoffed. “What does she want?” 

Kevan read the scroll. “She would like you to return to King’s Landing.” 

Tywin took it from him and read the missive for himself. “You mean she _commands_ me to return.” His lips nearly curved into a smile at the incredulity of it all. “Write back to her. If she needs more men, tell her to use her head and remind Paxter Redwyne she holds his sons. He will give her relief by sea before our return. Write to Stafford as well. Tell him to raise another host.” 

“Where is he to send them?” 

“For now it suffices that he ready the men and await further instructions.” 

“Redwyne and the Tyrells stood with Aerys-” 

“So long as Cersei holds their precious flower, she holds Mace Tyrell’s balls in her hands as well. Though had she half the brains given to a goose she’d write to Mace Tyrell, tell him the Stark betrothal was a mistake and propose a suit between Joff and his daughter. Tell her,” Tywin said, “to send an envoy to Highgarden.”

“She already has.”

  
“Not with the heads of men _she_ sent but with a proposal.” Cersei swore that outlaws killed Renly Baratheon and his men. _She must think the world full of fools._ “Robert and Stannis are dead. Mace Tyrell’s exile from relevance is over. The sniff of power alone will have him eating from her hand.”

“And the Stark girl?” 

“We’ll find her another husband. I have no intention to give her away so easily.” 

“Cersei won’t like giving the Tyrells any power.” 

“Who cares what Cersei thinks? Had she any sense she’d have taken that horrid boy of hers to hand. Instead she does as he bids...or worse as _she_ wills, and goes from one folly to the next. She names Janos Slynt, a man born a butcher’s son, Lord of Harrenhal for doing the very job he was sworn to do.” Tywin sighed. “She and that son of hers gave the man a seat of kings! Then they stripped the white cloak off Ser Barristan the Bold - a man whose name alone men bow to - and gave it to The Hound. The Hound! What honour does he lend to the man he serves? What counsel do those jackanapes give her? Our dear friend Petyr, the esteemed Grandmaester and that eunuch Varys? At best they are spineless worms and at worst snakes tearing her down and she is too stupid to see it.” He huffed and poured himself more wine before handing his brother a cup. “Since she likes orders so much, tell her I order her to make peace with the Tyrells.” 

Then he turned away to look out of the window again as his brother’s squill scratched it’s way across a new scroll. 

“You should know,” Kevan said when they went riding later that day, “Ser Emmon has arrived.” 

“With his father’s levies?” With no land of his own, the man lived with them at Casterly Rock though he’d been visiting a relative when Tywin raised his hosts. 

“No. He hasn’t yet had an opportunity to travel north. He would like to march with us to his father’s castle.” 

A bitter taste came to his mouth with his next words. “Genna should never have been forced to marry the spawn of that spineless man. What was he thinking?” Tywin remembered being a boy of ten when he opposed his sister’s marriage to Walder Frey’s son in front of all the lords of the west. His father turned as white as a sheet but let himself be cowed by the weasel that was Frey. _And now Frey sits in his castle with his men around him waiting for one side to prevail over the other, coward that he is._

They rode through the camp. Beyond the inn itself, the camp sprawled out like a large city. Closest to the inn were the high lords’ pavilions, as large as houses. The Marbrands’ pavilion was the closest to the inn. They were his mother’s house and the most loyal of his retainers. Tywin had never forgotten their loyalty when the Tarbecks and the Reynes rose up. They marched with him against them and his cousin Ser Addam was the most daring of his knights. The lords’ pavilions were followed by knights’ tents while the rabble slept in the open air. _In the rain._ Lord and rabble alike bowed their heads when Tywin rode by. 

“We cow the Stark boy,” Kevan said into the silence. “What next?” 

“We keep Stark’s daughters, take his heir hostage and use his armies to crush this... _lost prince_.” 

“Elia is married to a northern lord and Jaime says the Starks and Martells are bosom friends.” The undertone suggested the unsaid words of _thanks to you_ but his brother was too tactful to say that. 

Tywin’s lips twitched. Not quite a smile but the threat of one. His rare laughter died with Joanna. “Friendships fall when placed against family. Ned Stark will have to choose between his children and the child of another.” 

“What’s to say they have not yet come to a common cause against us?” 

“We’d have gotten wind of that. And if not us, Varys. The man swore himself to Robert. He’d find no place in a court ruled by Aerys’ grandson.” To Tywin’s surprise the boy made no move after taking Dragonstone. Tywin’s more immediate worries were the Starks and Arryns. The riverlords were already crushed. Tywin’s move north screened Jaime and freed him to take their heartland. Frey would not commit his troops until he saw a clear winner which meant the wintermen would have no choice but to break their armies against him here. At the crossroads he’d also be able to rout anyone coming down the high road. All Tywin had to do was make quick work of the Stark boy’s untested sword before the Knights of the Vale bestirred from their mountains. Sense and fear of what befell those before them would prevail over valour. _Then we’ll turn to the Mad King’s spawn._

“And the Golden Company?” 

“We threw them back in the sea once, brother. We will do so again.” 

They rode to the edge of the camp where towers of unmortared stone gave the sentries a view of the surrounding countryside, a low earthen wall four feet high stood as the perfect obstacle against a cavalry charge. As they rode back to the inn they passed through a barricade of sharpened stakes manned by bowing pikemen and archers. 

He was sharing a flagon of ale with his brother in the common room when the misshaped disappointment Joanna died to bring into the world waddled in. 

He greeted Kevan first before he bowed with a mocking, “And my lord father. What a pleasure to find you here.”

Tywin studied him, taking in his dirty face and shaggy, stinking, shadowskin cloak. “I see the rumours of your demise were unfounded.” Tywin had not mourned the boy. He didn’t find it in his heart to care for more than the name he sported. 

“Sorry to disappoint you, Father,” Tyrion said. “No need to leap up and embrace me, I wouldn’t want you to strain yourself.” 

Tywin grit his teeth. The boy had never learnt to keep his witty retorts to himself. Gerion only encouraged it in him when he was a boy. His stunted legs made him waddle in full view of the lords around him. Aware of Tywin’s icy look he tried once more to bring levity to the room. “Kind of you to go to war for me,” he said as he climbed into a chair and helped himself to a cup of the ale. 

“By my lights, it was you who started this. Your brother Jaime would never have meekly submitted to capture at the hands of a woman.” 

“That’s one way we differ, Jaime and I. He’s taller as well, you may have noticed.” 

“The honor of our House was at stake. I had no choice but to ride. No man sheds Lannister blood with impunity.” Since Tywin could not disprove the boy was not his, he had to march for the slight. Granted it was an excuse for an already planned move against Ned Stark but even if it were not, no man...or woman...would ever mock the name of Lannister again. 

“Hear Me Roar,” Tyrion grinned. “Truth be told, none of my blood was actually shed, although it was a close thing once or twice. Morrec and Jyck were killed. Lady Stark is dead.” 

“I knew that.” The news pleased him greatly. “I suppose you will be wanting some new men.” 

“Don’t trouble yourself, Father,” he replied, taking a swig of the ale. “I’ve acquired a few of my own.” Before Tywin could enquire about them the dwarf asked about the war and Kevan updated him. 

Tywin could not help but remind Tyrion of Jaime’s glories in smashing Vance and Piper at the Golden Tooth before going on to take Riverrun. “Ser Edmure Tully is captured. Lord Blackwood led a few survivors back to Riverrun, where Jaime has them under siege. The rest fled to their own strongholds.”

“Your father and I have been marching on each in turn,” Ser Kevan said proudly. “With Lord Blackwood gone, Raventree fell at once, and Lady Whent yielded Harrenhal for want of men to defend it. Ser Burton burnt out the Pipers and the Brackens …” 

They spoke about the Mallisters still being a problem but not an insurmountable one and the Freys being only an afterthought. 

“If you have a mind to make yourself of use,” Tywin told the dwarf. “I will give you a command. Marq Piper and Karyl Vance are loose in our rear, raiding our lands across the Red Fork.” Then there was the matter of Ned Stark’s afterthoughts The Lightning Lord he heard the smallfolk called him and the fat priest Thoros of Myr. “Do you think you might be able to deal with them as you scamper off? Without making too much a botch of it?”

He made a mockery of an answer about spanking Beric Dondarrion before asking for three thousand helmets for his plan to tie up the Arryns from taking the field. The door crashed open. The captain of the guard rushed to them and the wilding at the door snapped his sword in two. Kevan rose. Tywin sat where he was. He would not be cowed by a bunch of savages who...interestingly, seemed to know Tyrion. 

“Who might you be?” Tywin asked the first to stride toward him. 

Tyrion explained their acquaintance, Kevan voiced Tywin’s own thoughts about them being savages before trying to draw his sword. Tywin placed two fingers on his wrist. _Hold on._

“Tyrion,” he drawled, studying the savages. A man could always find a place for such men. _As fodder_. He would never trust savages to do his work. “Have you forgotten your courtesies? Kindly acquaint us with our … honored guests.”

Tyrion did, each had a more ridiculous name than the one before. 

Tywin stood when Tyrion introduced him and feigned knowledge of the wildlings’ prowess. “What brings you down from your strongholds, my lords?” 

“Horses,” said the one who burst into the room.

 _Idiot,_ Tywin thought. Of course Tyrion would bring him idiots. 

“A promise of silk and steel,” said one with half a brain. 

They got no further before a guard broke in with news of the Stark host travelling south. Tywin’s eyes crinkled with satisfaction. “So the wolfling is leaving his den to play among the lions.” The thought amused Tywin. The boy was foolhardy and no doubt seeking glory. _Roger Reyne sought the same. “_ Splendid! Return to Ser Addam,” Tywin ordered the messenger. “Tell him to fall back. He is not to engage the northerners until we arrive, but I want him to harass their flanks and draw them farther south.” _I will make quick work of him before the Vale has a chance to rise._

Kevan suggested they stay where they were with the ford close to them, ringed pits and spikes. “I say let them come, and break themselves against us.”

 _No Tywin thought._ “The boy may hang back or lose his courage when he sees our numbers.

The sooner the Starks are broken, the sooner I shall be free to deal with this Targaryen boy...send word to Jaime that I am marching against Robb Stark.” 

He promised the savages gold to march with him. He already knew what to do with them. They said they need not join him with all Tyrion promised them. It only took mentioning the ferocity of the northmen in battle and an insinuation of the wildlings’ inability to face them for them to induce their cooperation. They swore to march with him to show their valour. _Show it you will,_ Tywin thought. _Then you will die._

The ride north was long and wet. Rain pelted them for hours and hours until it soaked through his heavy ermine cloak.

They settled on a hill overlooking the kingsroad beside the green fork as their camp. From here, Tywin could see any approaching host. He could also drown them in the river when the battle was done. It was about time people had a reminder of what befalls the enemies of House Lannister. Given the rain and the muddy terrain Tywin elected to have his dinner in his great pavilion with his chief knights and lords. The dwarf was the last to arrive with pardons for being so late. He made a move to sit beside Kevan.

“Perhaps I’d best charge you with burying our dead, Tyrion,” Lord Tywin said. “If you are as late to battle as you are to table, the fighting will all be done by the time you arrive.” 

He was not in the best of moods. Ser Addam met them with news that Walder Frey's levies marched with the Stark host. As did, he heard, the Martell woman, Doran’s heir and Shireen Baratheon. The Starks, it seemed, had come to terms with the Martell woman and her son. As did Stannis’ daughter, whispering torrid rumours Tywin would drown them with. 

The scouts, plagued by wolves, last saw the Stark host marching just south of the twins. Since then none had returned. 

When Tywin told Tyrion, the boy tried to avoid the talk. 

“Does the thought of facing the Stark boy unman you, Tyrion?” he asked him. “Your brother Jaime would be eager to come to grips with him.”

“I’d sooner come to grips with that pig. Robb Stark is not half so tender, and he never smelled as good.” The boy had never learnt ridicule only invites further ridicule. 

Lord Lefford soon reminded him of that. “I hope your savages do not share your reluctance, else we’ve wasted our good steel on them.”

Kevan then disclosed his plan.. _.or part of it_. “We had a thought to put you and your wildlings in the vanguard when we come to battle.”

Tyrion was dumbfounded by the suggestion and floundered with excuses about his men’s unsuitability to the task. The savages had taken to fighting against one another. 

“When soldiers lack discipline, the fault lies with their lord commander,” Tywin reminded him. 

“A bigger man would be able to put the fear in them, is that what you’re saying, my lord?” 

Tywin turned to his brother. “If my son’s men will not obey his commands, perhaps the vanguard is not the place for him. No doubt he would be more comfortable in the rear, guarding our baggage train.” Nothing quite goaded a man into doing what he was told than being told he was not up to it. Tyrion was no different though he had the misguided notion Tywin was asking him to lead the van. Every feign required some truth to it. He’d place Burton and The Mountain’s men at the front to give his rout some credibility. 

The dwarf rose to leave but before he did he whispered low enough for none to hear. “So much for your certainty Frey would not fall until the winner was clear. How does it feel, Father? To be considered a loser?” 

Tywin let him walk off. It would be his last night alive. Tomorrow he’d fall with the van. 

The rain continued to pelt down long into the night. Tywin has just sent his barber away when Kevan strode in to tell him Tyrion had taken a whore to bed. He dried his hands on the linen towel. _The boy will not learn._ Whatever Tywin did, he refused to learn. Not even after that peasant girl. The boy married a crofter’s daughter and locked himself away with her in a cottage by the sea. _The misshapen lord’s son and his lady that wasn’t one_. It had been weeks before Jaime gave him up. Tywin made him watch as the whore was tumped by all of his guards and paid enough silver that it slipped through her fingers. Then he made Tyrion swive her last. 

Even that had not beaten out the love of whores from him. Tywin hated nothing more than whores who looked above their station and men who allowed them to do so. His son, like Tytos Lannister, was one of those men. Tywin could not stand that. Not after his father’s whore. The candlemaker’s daughter took to wearing his lady mother’s jewels and clothes and had the audacity to sit in attendance when Tytos Lannister was not around. When Tywin returned for his father’s funeral and saw what happened in his absence, he had the woman stripped of his mother’s clothes and paraded naked through the streets of Lannisport for a fortnight. He did not allow Tyrion’s crofter’s daughter to even think of reaching those heights. Nor would he allow this whore to build those dreams. Men had needs and whores fulfilled them. Tywin knew that as any man did but a lord found ways to keep the ridicule at bay. To protect Joanna’s honour, Tywin had a tunnel built in the Tower of the Hand to protect him from prying eyes and his woman from the tongues that wagged when his mother lived. His son did not even consider that.

“Keep an eye on him,” Tywin told Kevan. “He is not to take her with him when we leave.” _Not that he will._ If he did, and took her, Tywin would teach Tyrion another lesson faster than a whore ran away with coin when paid. 

They heard screaming punctuated by howling. Tywin grabbed his gilded sword and strode out. There was no time to grab his cloak or even yet a tunic. He was in nothing but a linen shirt. The rain had eased somewhat. The camp was overturned into chaos.

They moved through the camp in a blur. Time seemed to slow and Tywin’s limbs grew heavier until all that seemed to move were his eyes. The wolves moved from man to horse and horse to man tearing throats. Far in the distance he saw a man cut the horse lines. 

“There!” he shouted. No one seemed to hear him over the screaming and the burning of the pavilions. Tents crashed over men as they slept and horses trampled over any that might have lived. He saw men among the rabble run out into the night with nothing but the clothes on their back. Tywin caught one and killed him. His vision narrowed to a chute. A riderless horse spun away from his approach and at a break-neck speed trampled over trapped men under a tent. A white wolf, fearsome in sight, came running at him. Tywin held up his sword, ready. Kevan roared and cut down a wolf. The white wolf turned at once and went for Tywin’s stallion. The horse rolled its eyes, let out a high-pitched scream. The throes of death made it thrash it’s head for a long time. It beat it’s hooves in pain. The wolf darted for Tywin again and toppled him. His sword went flying. Tywin could smell the blood on its breath and its blood red eyes staring at him as it growled. Just before it could take his life, before Kevan could act, it jumped off him in the direction of another wolf. And just as they came, they were gone, leaving him with hundreds of dead men - most of them trampled - and fewer horses than he’d marched with. The bodies of some of the wolves littered the forest floor but they were few in number. Worst of all, his host’s supplies were burnt, leaving them with little food for a prolonged campaign. Coupled with Ned Stark’s group of miscreants plaguing his foraging parties and Marq Piper doing the same to Jaime’s supply lines...

“Did you catch the men?” Tywin asked. 

None of the captains could give him an answer. None of them had the audacity to ever meet his eyes. 

“M’lord, they seemed to have disappeared,” one said.

“Disappeared? Where were your sentries?!” Tywin smashed his fist into the desk.

Tyrion came stumbling in with a bloodied mouth and axe.

“They killed the sentries first m’lord.” Tywin hurled a burning torch at the man. The flames caught his cloak. Tywin ordered the captains beheaded in the middle of the camp. He had no place for incompetence. “If you’re thinking about deserting,” he told the gathered men, “when I crush the Starks, I will return to do to you as I did them.” Their heads and those of the wolves were placed on stakes around camp. “Find me those who did this and bring back those horses! Kill any deserter you find. I will give a hundred gold coins to the man who brings me the most heads.” 

“The Starks are here,” Tyrion announced. “The wolves were theirs. Though last I knew there were only six.”

“I saw at least a hundred.” 

“Not all of them were direwolves. The white one that took your stallion is the bastard’s. I know that much”

Tywin’s thoughts went back to the sharp teeth that nearly took his throat. He would take the wolf’s pelt for a cloak before the war was over. Luckily for him if anyone saw it topple him, they had the sense not to mention it.

“There is no host here,” Ser Addam pointed out. 

“How would you know?” Tyrion poured himself some ale. “None of your scouts have returned.” 

“We still have eyes on the Kingsroad.” 

“Ned Stark’s bastard was here. Perhaps Robb Stark himself was with him.” 

It took hours for them to recapture horses. With Tywin’s prized stallion gone, the master of horse presented stallion after stallion to him, none of them was fit for the coat that belonged to his loyal companion. The bastard and his wolf would pay. 

Just before dawn the trumpets began to sound. 

“They’ve stolen a march on us,” Addam told him. Were he not family and loyal beyond question Tywin would have killed him for this lapse. _How can they sneak up on us?_ He ordered his squires in. As they dressed him, he fortified his will to crush the boy once and for all. The anger bubbled through him. _They would pay._ He ordered the musicians to play the Rains of Castamere. Those who lagged behind in getting ready were whipped. That seemed to set an example and the host was ready in record time. His own squire had just finished fastening the second of the two lionesses crouched on his shoulders to hold his greatcloak in place. The cloak itself was sewn from countless of cloth-of-gold, so heavy that it barely stirred even when he charged. It was so large that its drape covered most of the new stallion’s hindquarters when he took the saddle.It was a white destrier, almost identical to his own and was dressed in its gilded armour. It's blanket was enameled with crimson scales, gilded crinet and chamfron with crimson silk bardings decorated with the lion of Lannister. When the day was done, Tywin wanted his horse to be as crimson as its armour with the blood of the northmen. 

It rankled him to present his troops for battle with fewer horses than intended but the Starks seemed to have even less. Much less. 

He surmised it must have been the reason they took a defensive position. Given their actions the previous night, Tywin had expected the boy to plan an all-out charge. Instead he placed his archers upon the hills and placed stakes behind them.

It didn’t matter. Seeking glory had the tendency to boil the blood of even the coldest of men. The wind favoured them. That too didn’t matter much. Archers were only useful so long as they did what was expected of them. They would not for very long. For a long while the two armies just watched one another. 

He saw Tyrion in the van and remembered his words _. ‘How does it feel, Father? To be considered a loser?’_ Tywin had once asked Tytos a similar question. Tywin was nothing like Tytos. _I will never be._

“Order the charge.” The trumpets sounded, visors clinked. Burton raised his sword and charged. Tyrion went with them. This dwarf that killed his wife. Suddenly he remembered Aerys’ words upon his birth. 

“ _The gods cannot abide such arrogance. They have plucked a fair flower from his hand and given him a monster in her place, to teach him some humility at last._ ”

Were it not for the fact that Tywin knew Joanna would never abide the man, he’d question the boy’s lineage. The twins had hair of beaten gold. The dwarf’s hair was a lighter hue. 

The arrows fell like a never-ending deluge, taking man and horse with them. Like a crazed man Burton continued on. As did The Mountain’s men. Tyrion’s wildlings fell like flies. Still no wolves showed up. The brave charged quickly against the mud, the prudent fell back to no avail. Those behind them pushed them forward or more accurately pushed them into the mud. The horses shied against the arrows bucking and rearing and crushing men. Burton made it past the stakes and disappeared behind the shield wall. Few horses made it past the stakes. Some men braved them but did not return. The van turned to chaos and the undisciplined men did as Tywin knew they would. They ran back down the hill. The mud drowned most when the horses stampeded their way back to safety. Burton Crakehall never returned. 

The northern archers were competent if nothing else. While most would draw and release as quickly as possible, they seemed to wait until the Lannister van was close enough for the lethality of their arrows to prove true against armour. 

Then he saw northmen rushing forward. _Come,_ he thought. Once they fell out from behind the stakes eager for a rout, Kevan’s pike would wheel and take them in the flank, driving them into the river while Tywin brought out the reserve to plunge into them like a dagger. 

Just as the first men made it past the stakes the beat of the drums changed. They stopped and retreated. The boy was proving more prudent than Tywin thought. _Still, no plan survives first blush._

The trumpets blared, ordering the centre to march forward on foot. The northmen had focused their shots at their horses. _Let’s see what they do against armour._ Walking into raining arrows was blind business. They caused a man to grow nervous but arrows were rarely lethal against a well-armoured man - something Tyrion’s wildlings were not. The mud seemed to weigh them down but they moved forward up the hill, dragging their armoured feet against the soil’s suction. 

Bodies littered the mud - especially near the river. The ground the centre marched on was not so polluted. Now the Lannister archers shot. The northmen raised their shields but the arrows found some. More men made it up this time. The archers hid behind the stakes and then their shield wall. 

Then began the battle proper. Kevan’s pikemen broke through them in many places. _Draw them out, Kevan. Draw them out._

A rider leapt over the stakes. Another followed him down the Stark right flank. Too late, Tywin saw them take Tyrion. He yielded without a fight, embarrassment that he was. He couldn’t even grant Tywin the courtesy of dying like a warrior. Before any relief could come to him they were back behind the northern lines. Behind the lines he could make out rectangular schiltron formation among the northmen. They pushed back Kevan’s force, though the westermen broke through in parts. 

Tywin let it continue for too long. He ordered the retreat of the centre. He’d already identified the weak points in the Stark lines. Now, he would flush out any cards they hid up their sleeves. He moved the rear forward and ordered the right flank and Kevan’s knights to ready for a charge. The archers were to move back ready to shower their wolves with arrows when they appeared. _Them and whatever horse they have hidden somewhere._ The trumpets blared so that only the front lines of Ser Addam’s men were to charge. The rest would wait to see what came out from behind the trees. The northmen were short on arrows now. This charge was not to be like that of the van. 

The moment they did, the Stark boy showed his hand as Tywin expected. Men began to charge out of the trees. Wolves at their front. 

“Now.” The trumpets blared. This time the arrows showered the wolves. 

Tywin nearly dropped his sword when he saw _him._ Across his white-enameled helm, the black bat of House Whent spread its wings. _He’s dead._ He saw another man deep in the Stark lines wearing a bull helmet. A white cloak. He shook his head. The northern drums seemed louder. They were moving closer. They were accompanied by trumpets that blared a different command to his own. They were coming from behind him. Tywin turned. Dragon banners. Elephants. His horse bolted. The mud slowed it down. It lost balance and fell and rose just as suddenly. One hand on the reigns, Tywin’s hold faltered. His feet remained in the stirrups but he fell backwards being dragged by this unknown horse. He held on for dear life to the reins with his left hand but the heavy cloak made it so hard to get back up. Not to mention the great lion helm on his head. His sword fell out of his right hand. 

“Retreat!” he cried out but it was little more than a croak. An arrow took a trumpeter in the neck. Blood was rushing to his head as the horse charged aimlessly. He watched them take his host from the rear. The horses went wild at the appearance of the elephants. _Tytos had one in his menagerie_ . Tywin’s vision was turning dark. In amongst the spots he saw men with crossbows firing from atop the elephants. The black banners of the dragon, the stag, a speared lion, the falling star, the griffin, the sun and spear, the black plowman, the red salmon. _I sacked Pinkmaiden_. Monford Velaryon. 

Then he saw it, the pale white sword. _Arthur Dayne._ The knight grinned and pursued him. Behind him was Rhaegar. Tywin fell off the horse.

“ _And who are you the proud lord said…”_ The Sword of the Morning’s cold steel was on his throat. The white wolf growled. Rhaegar stood beside him... _Not Rhaegar_ Tywin realised too late. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this was supposed to be a battle chapter but I’m more interested in character motivations. I think that’s also more interesting than re-reading a battle you’ve already read. So we spend more time in Tywin’s head than I’d originally intended.
> 
> First things first, Masha should never have died for the actions of Catelyn Stark. I hate Tywin for that. As a side note, I hate Tyrion too for his gloating at her body.
> 
> I don’t know if Tywin made the villagers watch but we do know he had the village burnt. I wouldn’t put it past him for events to take place the way they did here.
> 
> As for the battle itself, if you thought Roose threw away the battle… Tywin challenged him for first place in the loser olympics without even trying. 
> 
> 1\. He moved from the Inn @ the Crossroads. The reason I had him and Kevan ride through the camp was to show how well fortified it was. The northerners & wolves would have a much harder time against him if he stayed there. Kevan told him to wait there but noooo big Mr Tywin has to do what he wants.
> 
> 2\. He goes into the battle blind because he has Ser Addam pull back. 
> 
> 3\. He knows the Stark host is a day’s ride away the night before the battle but he doesn’t tell his own men when to be ready for the battle??? His army just about manages to pull their armour on even *with* Roose giving them time to get ready in canon. 
> 
> 4\. He doesn’t tell Tyrion about his plan to create a gap in his left flank. More of his own forces could’ve made it out alive had they known this (he has his archers shoot arrows indiscriminately). 
> 
> 5\. In this timeline he’s so drunk on his own legend he doesn’t question why he keeps coming upon empty holdfasts. Who would bother telling Tywin anything? He’s made himself something to fear. Had he half Robert’s charisma he might have gotten wind of what’s happening but he makes the smallfolk despise him almost immediately. The same goes for not knowing Harrenhal has been retaken. If his scouts are being killed (people accept the potential of scouts not returning), who is there to tell him? He’s made everyone see him as an enemy. 
> 
> So to summarise, the difference between Roose & Tywin is Roose was *trying* to lose. Tywin wasn’t. It really shouldn’t be surprising then that he has his arse handed to him now he’s facing a competent opponent. 
> 
> Jon’s chapter gave us the minutiae of the battle. This chapter hashed over it for two reasons. The first is you’ve already read how it played out. The second is Tywin couldn’t care less who died or suffered in the battle as long as he identified weaknesses. Such a shame he couldn't spare a thought to his own.


End file.
